The use of performance enhancers in sports is inevitable. Celebrating it instead of banning it would make competition safer, more honest, and more fun

Sports are supposed to be pure—that’s why there are rules and referees; that’s why the first Olympians competed in the nude. It’s also the reason that the federal government is spending millions and millions of dollars investigating a famous cyclist who has, after a decade of denials and countless drug tests, returned to the center of sports scandal. It must be summer, since Lance and doping have returned to the national discussion.

It’s only natural that when we discover our heroes have injected chemicals into their veins for a competitive edge (and I’m not saying Lance has, only that it’s looking increasingly difficult for him to prove that he hasn’t) we find them tainted and strip them of medals and put an asterisk by their names. Doping is ugly for fans but it goes beyond betrayal. Performance enhancers turn a contest between athletes into a competition among scientists and engineers. This is the best argument against enhancers. It’s also the best argument for them.

Let’s pretend, for a minute, that a separate league exists. Let’s call it the Asterisk League or, better, the League of Extraordinary Medicine. Drugs are legal but regulated. Athletes get educated about the risks, long term and short, of everything they introduce into—or onto—their bodies. Fans know exactly who is taking what and tracking their performance accordingly. Labs and scientists are inexorably linked to athletes’ rise and fall. Chemist versus chemist doesn’t sound like it would make great television, but the field would quickly advance to the point were records were broken daily and feats of crazy strength became the norm. Chemist versus chemist would become superhuman versus superhuman. Broadcasts could include expert scientists in the booth describing the limits of the human body and how these chemical enhancements get around that, or don’t. The League of Extraordinary Medicine is more honest, its regulation more sensible, since outlawing drugs just does not work—we’ve got a forever War on Drugs to prove it. And our tests for drugs still aren’t very good.

Through this openness the league creates an environment where cutting-edge science is discussed daily, and celebrated, alongside athletic triumph. Better still: legitimizing enhancement would make the enhancements better. More drugs hit the market, more treatments become available, and this would trickle down to non-athletes. Would all this openness and advancement foster a more honest, inviting, even wholesome environment? Maybe. Creating a separate league where drugs are legal would, without a doubt, make competition safer for athletes. Matthew Herper, who has covered science and health (and, by extension, athletes and drugs) for a decade at Forbes, says as much.
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2 ... d-athletes

Interesting point, such a league would help indeed.

The only problem here is: does this ensure that the use of drugs in the non asterisk league is gone? I don't think you can suppose that. Next to that, by the leaps forward that will be caused by this it will be impossible to keep track of all the drugs, leave alone stay up to date with drug detection. It would not only push science forwards (a good thing) but it would also stimulate drug use in the normal competition.

The main problem with this, is that even if it would stop drug use in the normal competition, that it would probably also largely kill it.
As the superhumans would set records twice as high as the normal ones, killing the public interest and player motivation for the normal league.

Thats how I think it would be, but ofc I'm not into sports so I might be wrong xD

Haha this reminds me of a futurama episode where they go to a baseball game and they're talking about players using steroids.

it would have some awesome effects on medical science, and genetic as well, causing em to create various types of "übermensch".
however, it's quite dangerous as well, primarily for the health of the athletes, as they will be trying all sorts of stuff out, wich could have dramatic results.
and if they succeed so make something like a superhuman-serum, that might result in slight Biosock-like escapades, or some big "gene maffia", wich is already happening btw.

I say we go with cybernetics

THe prob is that then normal leagues will probably become old and unused.

Untill cybernetics becomes so advanced that the superhuman league becomes boring to watch, but that might take a while

Yea but if the drugged league beats all the records by 2-3 times then it won't be cool anymore to watch "honest" athletes.
SO that would die off

It would be cool o watch honest athletes as soon as the drug enhanced athletes are all of the same strength, but that will take some time.

Well not really, like who watched womens sports? xD
I saw it once, where a woman beat the world record of highjumping, then the men were up and they raised the stick by another meter xD