Performance enhancing drugs are starting to change our society forever, and maybe not in the best way.  Professional athletes are now turning to the easy way.  These drugs are having a negative influence on our professional athletes and sports, we may not realize the immediate effects of a performance enhancer scandal but they are there.  PED’s reflect a certain image they may be near impossible to change.  Generally, society looks down on people that “juice up” and see it as a form of cheating.  Performance enhancers should not be allowed in professional sports and recreational use of these drugs is unsafe and unhealthy, and we need to regulate them more and more efficiently.  

There has been a huge controversy over performance enhancers in recent years.  There is a varying range of perspectives on this topic which makes it so hard to contemplate and figure out.  There have been surveys and records that show people agree that performance enhancers should not be allowed in professional sports and society.  Research has been done on this topic and some of it is viable but it really is not fully done.  There are still a lot of details and kinks that researchers must work out for the drug to be safe for recreational everyday use.  Prescription use is different because it is regulated by a doctor and safe because it is doled out in moderation.  From most of the doctors that do research on this topic they all agree that the drugs have benefits and negative effects, although with that said, the negatives outweigh the positives.  The author of “The Controversy Over Performance Enhancing Drugs”, Sanaz Majd, has many links and evidence in his article that prove that PED’s are bad for your body physically.  Sanaz Majd has evidence to support her claims ranging from the Olympics to everyday things.  Another major factor in this argument is bias, the majority of doctors are obviously biased towards the safer side of the drug. Whereas body builders, will want the best benefits for them and quickest results usually not worrying about the negative benefits.  

Everyone has heard the “drugs are bad for you” speech time and time again, but what if there was a drug out there that did the complete opposite?  Researchers seem to think that the research is there and that performance enhancers are beneficial for your health.  According to Weebly.com “The benefits that steroids offer to competitors in the sports world are plentiful.” So, the drugs absolutely have benefits especially if you take them controllably.  The drugs can boost productivity and help you gain muscles and other improvements in your physical health faster.  For example, it increases muscle mass, definition and strength.  Besides the physical benefits, it helps effectiveness of training, you recover faster and improved sex drive.  Obviously, performance enhancers are illegal unless it is prescribed by a doctor, which in that case there should not even be an argument about if that is safe.  But in general, it should be legalized and there are many reasons for it to be legalized.  A direct quote from a few researchers on the website, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, said “PED use rarely brings individuals to emergency rooms, because the most widely used class of PEDs, AASs, rarely precipitate a medical emergency comparable to an overdose of alcohol or heroin.”  So, the medical cases involving a terrible incident with PED’s are way less likely to happen than even an alcohol related one. 

Who would not want a perfect body?  Everyone strives for it and its becoming a norm, an easy way to get there is steroids.  This has not been a recent trend either, body builders have known to take steroids since body building was a thing.  Now society is even looking toward legalizing performance enhancers in sports and even encouraging athletes to use them.  With substances like these humans can reach super human abilities and will make sports more interesting.  The perspective here is that the enhancers improve almost all your physical abilities and that outweighs anything else.  The drugs are beneficial for your physical appearance, you develop more muscle more strength and endurance, there are a few health risks, but acquiring a super human physique outweighs those risks.  When people know they can achieve their goals faster it makes them more focused and dedicated.  The main reason behind these enhancers is to make gains as soon as possible and when want to do that they turn to these drugs.  Performance enhancers in professional sports makes it so much more interesting to watch.  Many players in the MLB have set records for home runs, football players have done the same and it makes it more interesting to watch the games.  If every player in the leagues used a performance enhancer, there would not be an unfair advantage because everyone would be that much better, faster, and stronger. Even in body building competitions if everyone juiced up, everyone would be that much bigger and stronger.  With everyone using the enhancers everyone will be fit and strong and there is not anything wrong with that.

As we know many performance enhancers are illegal for many reasons but it is understandable that they could be legal under certain circumstances.  There could be a compromise between the two, for example we could regulate the recreational use of the drug and have it completely banned from sports.  That could be a potentially fair compromise if we research the drug more and the recreational use more stabilized and safe.  Performance enhancers have pro’s and con’s, yet at the same time so does everything.  You do get stronger and faster although there are long term deficits that can be more damaging.  It can be argued that it is beneficial and harmful, which it is.  In my opinion I think that the drugs should not be allowed in sports, which they currently are not I just think they could be more regulated just for the sake of perspective that these players present for our society. Enhancers should not be promoted in sports, I could understand a slight legalization of the drug however.  If there was just a little more research and knowledge about the drug then I would say it would be fine for recreational use.  It would make sense that if these drugs are more regulated then it would be safe for an everyday American to take them.  But it is a huge responsibility to be on steroids for instance.  You must watch your diet, obviously, you should exercise, or else you will start seeing negative results.  This does not only apply to steroids, there are other enhancers that can be abused or not taken correctly that can mess your health up.  I understand the medically prescribed enhancers, there is not anything wrong with that, if people need steroids for medical reasons that is perfectly fine.  But one thing that should not happen is allowing these in professional sports, I just think it gives a bad image for everyone involved not to mention the effects on the user’s health.  If there was a consensus that the drug was beneficial it would be clear that it should be legal.  if society generally accepted the drug as beneficial and if there was more research and knowledge about taking the drug recreationally I think at that point it would be fine to legalize it.  Until then it needs to be more regulated in our professional sports. 

Both sides of the argument are understandable, so in order to come to a solution we would have to make a few compromises legally and in society accepting these changes.  So a possible solution would be to completely legalize or ban the drug, which would cause chaos.  Here is why, if the government completely banned steroids or all performance enhancers that are currently legal, then people that need these drugs, ca not.  Some people need it to survive due to diseases and such and if the drug is banned then people’s lives will be lost.  Also, people would still want the drug, such as steroids, if it was banned.  So, the pricing would spike and be extremely hard to get.  If the drug is not regulated at all and complexly legalized, people would abuse it and a lot more overdoses and health risks associated with this drug will occur.  People would be irresponsible about taking the drug and want to experiment with it and not know how it will affect them.  That could potentially be a bigger risk than not having the drug for medical reasons.  At least if we have the drugs for medical reasons we can help the people that actually need it, which I understand, if someone needs it for a medical reason it should be given out respectively.  

Performance enhancing drugs should not be allowed in professional sports or recreational use, they are unhealthy and can be hazardous if they are not used correctly.  The research is not quite there for recreational use of these drugs, although it is being developed it would be dangerous to experiment.  Not to mention when our professional athletes get caught or accused using performance enhancers it portrays a certain image to society and the youth that look up to those “super stars”.  It may not seem like a big deal but when little kids see these incidents they think that drugging will be the only way to achieve their dreams.  Cheating should not be the goals for our youth and it should not be accepted in our society, it teaches all the wrong lessons.  Many researchers have concluded that steroids lead to a plethora of health problems for example, drugs.com’s article by L. Anderson has a list consisting of “Liver, heart, and kidney disease.  Heart attacks and strokes” taking the drugs recreationally or in excess can lead to any of those serious life threatening incidents.  I do not understand why people would put their lives at risk just to get a tiny bit closer to their goals that can be achieved without these drugs.  Our society is already creeping toward this trend.  As most people have probably noticed, the “ideal body” in advertisements and social media.  People see it everywhere they look and wonder how they can achieve that.  Most of the time the answer ends of being performance enhancers unfortunately.  Usually body builders are on “roids” and even some models are on some type of supplement or unhealthy diet to help keep them skinny.  The average person is told to have these freak of nature, super human bodies when the fact is, not everyone can.  For some people, it is physically impossible for them to reach a similar level to some top tier body builders.  In that case, they turn to PED’s that can help them reach those goals, most of the time when people do this they do not have any background knowledge of what the drug does to you or how it will affect you personally.  Getting information or advice from friends or people that have done it is a good idea but you never know how the drug will treat you. It is proven that some performance enhancers can lead to deformities, there have been a few body builders that used a street drug version of steroids and their muscles have become unsymmetrical and deformed.  So that proves you just never know how the drugs will affect you personally and you never know what is in them unless you get them prescribed.  

We even see it in sports all the time, athletes juicing up to get the unfair advantage and be the best.  It does not make sense to me that athletes turn to cheating to get an edge on the competition.  Our athletes are supposed to be role models and kids look up to them.  Performance enhancers are extremely popular in the Olympics, which is probably the biggest sporting event in the world.  These top athletes use the drugs to get the edge on competition, which does not make sense to me because if you use the and win, does it really count as winning?  Because when athletes get caught for “using” their awards get taken away.  So, it is cheating at least by the Olympic community.  We see the same thing in weight lifting and body building, more drugs, more cheating, and it just does not make sense to me.  If you are a professional athlete it does not make sense to out your health at risk to get just a little bit stronger and faster.  If every professional athlete used steroids then we might as well just be watching robots play our sports, it is just a physical booster to get you to a higher level.  We need to keep the drugs out of our sports at least, for the sake of the game.  We need to get rid of these drugs completely besides medical reasons obviously because people need those to survive.  There are just too many negatives to make up for the positives.  

In conclusion, I think we are on track towards keeping performance enhancers regulated and safe.  Basically, the research and knowledge just is not there for recreational use.  If more people knew the side effects and what it does to your body, less people would take them.  They ignore the negative effects to gain the positive ones.  If you are prescribed the drug, there is not anything wrong with that I think it is perfectly fine.  When people abuse them, and do not know much about what it will do to them besides help them gain muscle quicker, that is dangerous.  It can be seriously detrimental to their well-being, like I said before some of the side effects are life threating and I do not think it is worth it. It would be a challenge to figure it all out legally and scientifically because of all the angles you could take on this topic, but it is possible.  Again, I think we are on the right track to keep these drugs maintained but we ca not let it get out of hand and have it become a general thing in society.  
