Jacob Baxter
Diet & Fitness – Coach Stewart
Feb. 11th 2015
Bigger, Stronger, Faster I always had mixed feelings regarding steroid use before seeing this film. Like most, I had a part of me that would say it was a form of cheating, and another that would try and justify the use. Of course, growing up my parents and all adults would caution that the use of steroids would do harm to your body, so naturally that was my opinion at first as well.
When the film first starts, Chris Bell interviews the early members of Gold’s Gym. This takes me back to that era where everyone wanted to be the biggest, steroids were looked at like a normal part of life to these guys. Some of them would literally live in their vans just to be able to go to Gold’s and work out with the best in hopes of becoming the best. On the flip side during this era was also steroid use going on in baseball. This entire generation whether being in competitive sports or recreational use was exposed to steroids as being a normal thing. In baseball at the time if you weren’t using steroids then your name wasn’t brought up because of the amount of guys that were using were simply outweighing you. Forcing the pressure to make you use in order to compete.
Comparing then to now I believe the same concept is still applied but is just covered by deception. Like most things nowadays, it is unclear to see the dividing line between truth and false. We are still seeing and discovering old athletes, when in their prime and best, were in fact using steroids. I do believe that when used in an athletic standpoint steroids is in fact unfair when put up against a truly all-natural athlete. The case being that steroids enhances your strength and over all well-being with little to no consequences to your body. So why don’t we just say to hell with the regulations and just let all athletes use them and become the best to their ability. I believe that we should sell steroids in stores and pharmacies as a normal thing and tax them so the state is getting the money for them instead of the black market or Mexico.
After the discover of these baseball players using steroids, congress spent over 150 days debating the use of steroids. At the time that was more than they had ever spent debating healthcare and the war going on in Iraq. Just based on these facts alone I would be inclined to make the statement that steroids are part of the United States culture and we value it.
It wasn’t until after high school that I really started seeing steroids trend in my peers and others around me. I have a particular friend that had been on and off of using them for quite sometime now and is easily the biggest and strongest guy that I know that is our age. He had been