Today’s release of the Mitchell Report reminds me of an old, dear friend of mine in high school who was abusing steroids. He was a sweet kid, and I remember even then that I was so worried about him that, for a class, I did a research project on steroid use and athletics so I could try to learn more and convince him that aiming for biceps the size of my waist was not worth the risk he was taking.
I came of age in what has now been dubbed the Steroid Era in sports, and I find the implications of such a moniker more than disturbing: they are misleading. The truth is that performance enhancing techniques are not at all limited to athletics, and congressional inquiries that call out professional athletes do little to mitigate the problem.
Here’s what I mean: ours is a culture obsessed with performance, with besting, with record breaking, with exponentially—and often falsely—inflating human capital. In a competitive market, this drive for ‘excellence’ can be a useful thing, something that spurs progress and resourcefulness. But when any capital is falsely inflated, including human capital, the consequences can be devastating. Where, then, is the line? The balance?
Case in point: a recent study at Columbia confirmed what those in academe have heard about in hushed asides for some time: students’ abuse of drugs like Adderall and Ritalin to enhance their academic performance through increased concentration has risen sharply over the last 15 years—somewhere in the vicinity of a 93% increase. What was once an overuse of caffeine in academic life has become an abuse of other types of pharmacological stimulants. Students who turn to these measures have little difficulty rationalizing their choice because taking measures to improve oneself in any manner possible to achieve ‘excellence’ is deeply ingrained in our cultural attitude.
Arguably, as our technologies advance, as we demand more of ourselves, as we understand more about the ways our bodies and minds perform, it is logical to apply our emergent findings and resources and meld body with science in order to increase our collective human capital. When one considers the ways in which scientific intervention has allowed individuals to improve their quality of life—I myself have titanium in my ear where my malfunctioning stapes used to be—the occasional misuse of drugs to enhance performance—say, during finals or during the World Series—follows an accepted cultural trend.
Now, before anyone accuses me of making a faulty argument through a false analogy (or worse), let me be clear: I understand that correcting a hearing impairment is very different, ethically, than abusing steroids or Ritalin or any other controlled substance. I also want to make clear that I am neither endorsing nor condoning the misuse of substances to increase performance; I am merely trying to make the point that given our cultural climate, the use of such performance enhancing techniques should not be surprising.
To my mind, the Mitchell Report speaks to a cultural issue, not a policy issue. This brings me to my main contention: what, exactly, is the role of governance in shaping culture? While this question is central to my dissertation, it holds particular importance as we approach an historic presidential election where most if not all candidates are running on a platform focusing on cultural or social issues rather than policy issues. While the relationship between governance and culture cannot and should not be denied, relying on governance or repeatedly turning to governance to mitigate social and cultural trends and problems absolves those who are truly responsible for cultural change: we individuals who regularly define through our actions and voices and choices our collective cultural identity.
