There are cases where removing "how" changes the meaning so much it's no longer accurate, but I assume the idea is that the submitter can always edit it back in. For example, a headline on nytimes now reads "How the 9/11 Plea Deal Came Undone". Someone who submits this as the title will feel compelled to reinsert "how" because "The 9/11 Plea Deal Came Undone" is too misleading as to the actual content.
Generally speaking though the rule may well be worth it. "How" and "why" are often overused in headlines to draw readers in by promising revelatory details about "how something works".
> But you see a heck of a lot of athletes with puffers, which seems statistically unlikely because for somebody to become a world-class athlete they probably wouldn't start out with a puffer.
Some of it can be training induced asthma, though. At least it was quite common when I grew up that the cross country skiers all had breathing problems from training hard in cold weather. (There is better knowledge and guidelines and regulations around this now, at least, avoiding exposing kids to this too much).
I've heard before that elite athletes have higher rates of asthma. Iirc a hypothesised explanation is that asthma in developmental years causes psychological resilience to intense training, thus increasing the chances of reaching advanced levels, especially if the asthma becomes milder over time.
Incredibly, nearly 60% of endurance athletes are recorded as being asthmatic. Compared to 5-10% of the general population.
The introduction does corroborate your point:
> It has been proposed that asthma among endurance athletes could arise from prolonged mechanical stress of the airway
surface and increased ventilation causing airway remodeling. This could indicate that a specific underlying pathomechanism exits, most likely related to endurance sport.
> The argument in favour of TUEs, which were first introduced in the early 1990s, is that they level the playing field for athletes deemed to be suffering from legitimate medical concerns that can be treated with otherwise-banned drugs.
I'm not sure I'm on board with this. Presumably, by "level the playing field" they mean "make the person better/more competitive." So why not let anyone take drugs to make it easier for them to compete as well? It isn't just hard work and dedication that makes a top athlete.
> why not let anyone take drugs to make it easier for them to compete as well?
There's two robust reasons I know of for banning a performance-enhancing substance: health risks, and equality of opportunity (e.g. if a substance is expensive to get hold of or has been developed privately).
I'm guessing that in the case of therapeutic uses, the pros are considered to outweigh the cons.
I can't wait for the "enhanced games" to take place and finally put to rest this nonsensical morality over performance enhancing drugs.
Every professional athlete uses PEDs already and they do so discretely. Let's dispell with the nonsense that they don't.
Take the 23 Chinese swimmers who all got caught and WADA hand waived it by saying it was doped meat. Are you kidding me?
Common complaints about PED use range from inaccurate to outright lies. Steroids can be used at appreciable levels 200-500mg when blood tests are done regularly. Damage to the cardio system only occurs when you don't do cardio and let your hematocrit get too high.
Pro athletes who do PEDs will have access to the best doctors and medical care money can buy. They are prized stallions and will be well taken care of.
So that leaves us with the final one which is, "it will encourage normies to do PEDs for the gainz!"
Trust me, every fitness magazine does that already.
The sooner the WADA, USADA , and IOC get a kick to the face when the attention to them disappears is when this pearl clutching finally ends.
Sports are entertainment, people want to be entertained, and advertisers want eyeballs. If it falls outside of that scope then it's a waste of time.
This is bad journalism. The writers have not done their research on the effects of the "banned drugs" they are mentioning. Someone who doesn't have ADHD would only get negative side-effects from taking stimulants, like hunger suppression, anxiety, depression and much more. Stimulants don't have the same effect on a brain that is not dopamine deficient. Ventolin for asthma has absolutely no effect on someone who doesn't have an issue with their airways narrowing due to asthma.
Besides, the information they are reporting on is private and was wrongfully leaked. Broadcasting it and even framing it in a bad light is simply wrong.
If anything, the athletes who truly are abusing these TUE rules probably do so out of superstition, to gain any advantage possible, real or otherwise. But I do not believe that they gain an actual advantage over other competitors who aren't taking these drugs.
Well, that's not entirely correct — amphetamines even for people without ADHD are still going to cause stimulation, euphoria, etc. Albuterol (Ventolin) is still a beta 2 agonist whether or not you have asthma, and exercise-induced bronchoconstriction is still going to benefit from that.
> Stimulants don't have the same effect on a brain that is not dopamine deficient
Well yeah you're right, it tends to produce euphoria, stimulation, and improved mood, which is why it's such a massively abused drug.
I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with the article but saying that therapeutic drugs have zero or only negative effect on people without their targeted pathologies is just plain wrong. I know a lot of athletes do things for "superstition" but when competing at the highest levels, I would wager that pharmaceuticals are probably pretty carefully evaluated for risk/reward.
Old article from Fuzzy Bear / RU hacks in retaliation to Sochi drama.
Subsequent leaks show US/Australia/France account for something like 60% of ~1000 global TUEs. TUEs is just west being good at lawfare to stack games in their favour, from having shitload of medals in swimming (or cutting medals in weightlifting) etc etc.
My hot take as someone who enjoys strength sports, especially the untested drama is TUEs is more pernicious to fairness than banned PEDs. Banned PEDs actually have to be cycled off prior to competition, most of their value is increasing recovery, enabling more training etc. Meanwhile TUEs affect actual competition. Stuff like Adderall ADHD TUEs particularly "mental" performance enhancing, like everyone who trains seriously knows mental game is what makes a huge difference at top after physicality is filtered by genetics. If athlete mentally not capable of training protocol, they might as well as be genetically cursed.
16 comments
[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 65.4 ms ] threadIs this auto-edit rule really worth it?
Seems like removing the "how" simply exposes the presuppositions a bit more without changing the meaning.
Generally speaking though the rule may well be worth it. "How" and "why" are often overused in headlines to draw readers in by promising revelatory details about "how something works".
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/20/world/asia/chinese-swimme...
Some of it can be training induced asthma, though. At least it was quite common when I grew up that the cross country skiers all had breathing problems from training hard in cold weather. (There is better knowledge and guidelines and regulations around this now, at least, avoiding exposing kids to this too much).
I just did a bit of Googling and found this study of athletes from the 2008 Beijing Olympics: https://scholar.google.com/scholar_lookup?journal=Allergy&ti...
Incredibly, nearly 60% of endurance athletes are recorded as being asthmatic. Compared to 5-10% of the general population.
The introduction does corroborate your point:
> It has been proposed that asthma among endurance athletes could arise from prolonged mechanical stress of the airway surface and increased ventilation causing airway remodeling. This could indicate that a specific underlying pathomechanism exits, most likely related to endurance sport.
I'm not sure I'm on board with this. Presumably, by "level the playing field" they mean "make the person better/more competitive." So why not let anyone take drugs to make it easier for them to compete as well? It isn't just hard work and dedication that makes a top athlete.
There's two robust reasons I know of for banning a performance-enhancing substance: health risks, and equality of opportunity (e.g. if a substance is expensive to get hold of or has been developed privately).
I'm guessing that in the case of therapeutic uses, the pros are considered to outweigh the cons.
Every professional athlete uses PEDs already and they do so discretely. Let's dispell with the nonsense that they don't.
Take the 23 Chinese swimmers who all got caught and WADA hand waived it by saying it was doped meat. Are you kidding me?
Common complaints about PED use range from inaccurate to outright lies. Steroids can be used at appreciable levels 200-500mg when blood tests are done regularly. Damage to the cardio system only occurs when you don't do cardio and let your hematocrit get too high.
Pro athletes who do PEDs will have access to the best doctors and medical care money can buy. They are prized stallions and will be well taken care of.
So that leaves us with the final one which is, "it will encourage normies to do PEDs for the gainz!"
Trust me, every fitness magazine does that already.
The sooner the WADA, USADA , and IOC get a kick to the face when the attention to them disappears is when this pearl clutching finally ends.
Sports are entertainment, people want to be entertained, and advertisers want eyeballs. If it falls outside of that scope then it's a waste of time.
Besides, the information they are reporting on is private and was wrongfully leaked. Broadcasting it and even framing it in a bad light is simply wrong.
If anything, the athletes who truly are abusing these TUE rules probably do so out of superstition, to gain any advantage possible, real or otherwise. But I do not believe that they gain an actual advantage over other competitors who aren't taking these drugs.
> Stimulants don't have the same effect on a brain that is not dopamine deficient
Well yeah you're right, it tends to produce euphoria, stimulation, and improved mood, which is why it's such a massively abused drug.
I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with the article but saying that therapeutic drugs have zero or only negative effect on people without their targeted pathologies is just plain wrong. I know a lot of athletes do things for "superstition" but when competing at the highest levels, I would wager that pharmaceuticals are probably pretty carefully evaluated for risk/reward.
Subsequent leaks show US/Australia/France account for something like 60% of ~1000 global TUEs. TUEs is just west being good at lawfare to stack games in their favour, from having shitload of medals in swimming (or cutting medals in weightlifting) etc etc.
My hot take as someone who enjoys strength sports, especially the untested drama is TUEs is more pernicious to fairness than banned PEDs. Banned PEDs actually have to be cycled off prior to competition, most of their value is increasing recovery, enabling more training etc. Meanwhile TUEs affect actual competition. Stuff like Adderall ADHD TUEs particularly "mental" performance enhancing, like everyone who trains seriously knows mental game is what makes a huge difference at top after physicality is filtered by genetics. If athlete mentally not capable of training protocol, they might as well as be genetically cursed.