That Competitive Spirit

After watching the press conference yesterday regarding steroid abuse in major league baseball, I can't help but fall back on exactly the kind of rationale that society (or at least the corporate dictators who run our official media) despises (and yes, I know I use too many parentheses in my writings). At the risk of sounding like a Marxist shill (which I kinda am...see, that's just way too many parentheses), isn't it something of a damn shame that there are men in the world of professional sports, already gifted with athletic ability far beyond what most of us will ever comprehend or could ever dream of achieving, who succumb to the unbearable pressure imposed upon them to break records - historical or financial - even if that requires breaking their bodies and ruining their future long term health in the process? It's such an age-old story and so commonplace that it barely even registers anymore. But does nobody feel some ugly thing in their conscience when they realize that America is now at a point where an early death is considered a fair price to pay for a better than average home run or RBI stat? We're constantly reminded that competition is a natural thing, but is natural always desirable? Disease is natural too. Deformity, sickness, mortality - all natural. But who wants them? Who seeks them out? If competition leads to the degradation of body, to the perversion of everything that ones soul finds noble, couldn't we find something better with which to occupy our time? The root cause is easy to pinpoint, as always. Hit more home runs and more people will watch; more people watch, more money. After that the only question is 'how do you hit more home runs?' The players found the answer. So some of them sacrifice everything worth keeping and make money doing so. Never forget that as much money as they make for themselves, they make far more for the organization that owns them, the organization that demands ever increasing revenue, ever higher profits. The marketplace in action. Now I doubt much will happen from Mitchell's report or Selig's response; none of this was exactly what you'd call 'news'. But even if it was only the official report of the worst kept secret in sports, it still serves a decent enough purpose. It perhaps can lead to more prevention of steroid abuse at the high-school and collegiate levels, though that's debatable. It can act as yet another sad example of where the endless pursuit of wealth ultimately leads, which happens to be the one lesson that corporate America doesn't want anyone to hear. And truthfully, it has made me understand I'm not without some blame in this scenario, nor is any other sports fan. I haven't been an active baseball fan in a while, but I still love - of all things - boxing, which is now virtually a cult fringe in the world of sports. The same sport whose exploitation and destruction of its participants is legendary. I was one of the unlucky ones who sat and watched a young fighter named Beethoven Scottland beaten to death on live television in the summer of 2001. I watched Diego Corrales absorb countless blows to the head, hearing his speech slurring more and more with each new post-fight interview before his tragic death via drunken motorcycle accident this past year. I know what Bobby Chacon is like today, decades after his classic brawling days came to an end. Why I continue to watch after all that I have no idea, but I do. Maybe I, like so many others, simply think this is the way it's always been and always will be. Like deformity, sickness and mortality. And maybe I, like so many others, need to keep in mind that there's a sickness in the way I've been taught to think about competition, about success, and about the 'root cause' that motivates us to do all sorts of very bad things.