of b-ball brawls and BALCOs

I felt compelled to write Ray Ratto this short email in response to this column he posted on ESPN.com yesterday. I think he's completely correct...

Mr. Ratto:

I read your column today on ESPN.com regarding the steroids
controversy and I felt compelled to let you know that I consider your
comments to be utterly reasonable--and by that I mean the only tenable
position that a sports fan who is also a human being can maintain.
Like certain political leaders, there are many people in this world
who are moral absolutists that never recognize their own complicity in
a situation--be it in a terrorist attack or a steroid-abuse scandal.
While I hesitate to use sports analogies, I think the comparison is
apt because it is not really JUST sports and it is not really JUST
politics we are talking about; it is the human urge to point the
finger when something we refuse to acknowledge publicly is thrown in
our collective face. If we stopped damning "those people"--whether
those people are of a different ethnicity or a different athletic
caliber--and started asking the more complicated (and more honest)
questions about WHY "those" people are acting the way they are, we
won't ever find an means to resolving situations that we can only
pretend to have simple resolutions. Keep writing brave words...

I know it's kinda sentimental, but I think Mr. Ratto is in the right--how arrogant are we to so enjoy professional athletes' performances, only to turn around and be so puritanical, self-righteous, and trigger happy? Why the disconnect between the joy we have for watching sporting spectacles and the mandatory public indignation when the players reveal their artifice? As Mr. Ratto insists, if we are going to have a witch hunt, then we should burn all the witches. I, for one, and I don't think I am alone, do not believe in double standards for professional athletes, as a privilege, a hinderance, or otherwise.