DeletedUser
Your post here is very confusing, you tell me that no-one can provide statistics on an allegedly common problem, before providing me an article from a reputable source that offers statistics:Pshawww!! Putting words in my mouth
That isn't what I said and you know it!! Tsk Tsk Diggo.....*runs to Hellstromm to complain*
Seriously though, DOJ keeps records for things that go boom in the night, that are caught. Until recently (last 5 years or so) colleges have been the biggest abuser of performance drugs by young people. The reason it isn't "tallied" if you will is the same reason Penn State got away with hiding a pedi for so long. Or FL A&M with hazing. They have some leniency on reporting "investigations" and such. A lot of time it doesn't come to light till after the fact. Now High Schools are taking note of the epidemic, and are figuring out ways to combat the issue...ie: random drug testing without warning (TX). But they still don't have to report it, most times the kid gets "counseling" and thrown off the team. *I can only speak for Texas and Florida, and a very little bit about 'bama and Georgia and Louisiana.
NYTimes article.
"A survey by the University of Michigan revealed that 2.2 percent of the nation’s 12th graders admitted in 2007 that they had used steroids at least once, down from 4 percent in 2002."
It's no secret that twelfth graders have the most to gain from lucrative scholarships, the pressure to enhance their performance in any way possible is immense. Yet only one student from fifty, about one student from two combined classes, has resorted to steroids. I assure you that is far less than many other potentially harmful substances such as alcohol and recreational drugs; not a bad overall result given the number of instances has halved across five years.
Clearly the vast majority of our aspiring athletes can handle the pressure, not attempting to emulate elite athletes who are already surrounded in controversy about performance enhancing drugs.
So eating disorders do not compare in magnitude to performance enhancing drugs? Then you're making a mountain out of an molehill, a fallacy.Upon this flawed logic, you're already making another unsupported assumption, that children will attempt to emulate elite athletes under all circumstances. Children attempt to emulate their heroes, not necessarily elite athletes, and highly unlikely they would be were the drug consuming process made transparent.
Social costs? Health costs? Moral costs? Ethical costs? What is immoral and unethical is the current cheating of the rules, whereby elite athletes take performance enhancing drugs behind closed doors, then society trumpets them as the best nature has to offer. Let health professionals in to monitor the practise and minimise existing risk. Send a clear message to aspiring, young athletes that they are not expected to meet professional standards naturally, you no longer need to be pressured to match performances using drugs, and if you do we'll know something is wrong.
Nice emotional appeal there, but that is also a fallacy since your point is grounded in empathy rather than logic. Nevertheless, thanks for identifying a key issue here. The real problem here is that some American youth lack an informed perspective, or as you put it "have no common sense or sense of boundaries". Well, let's set a nice easy one that even Sarah Palin could comprehend. Elite athletes are highly paid professionals, assisted by the finest medical staff, using performance enhancing drugs in combination with natural ability to produce unnatural displays of strength. Youth are unpaid amateurs, with no access to medical guidance regarding drugs, who are not expected to reproduce the unrealistic performance of the elite. The best way we could avoid handing youth our own pistol is to stop expecting the impossible from them, then offer rewards for it.
