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from the amateurs-doping-like-the-pros dept.
After disclosures of an extensive, state-run doping program in Russia, sports officials have been retesting urine samples from the 2008 and 2012 Summer Olympics, in Beijing and London. Their findings have resulted in a top-to-bottom rewriting of Olympics history.
More than 75 athletes from those two Olympics have been found, upon further scrutiny, to be guilty of doping violations. A majority are from Russia and other Eastern European countries. At least 40 of them won medals. Disciplinary proceedings are continuing against other athletes, and the numbers are expected to climb.[...]
The drugs were not detected by the Olympic committee's drug-testing lab years ago, during the Games, because the science at the time was not sensitive enough to detect such small residual concentrations,[...]
"This completely rewrote my Olympics story," said Chaunté Lowe, an American high jumper who participated in four Summer Games but had never won a medal.[...]
Accompanying the joy of her belated recognition, she said, was an awareness of the opportunity costs she suffered. In 2008, her husband was laid off. The couple's house in Georgia was foreclosed on that year, something Ms. Lowe said would not have happened had she distinguished herself in Beijing. I was really young and promising at that point, and sponsors were interested in me," said Ms. Lowe, now 32. "A lot of interest goes away when you don't get on that podium."
Should the Olympics require countries to post a bond if their athletes win a medal, so that if they are discovered to have cheated the people most affected can receive compensation?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Ethanol-fueled on Friday November 25 2016, @10:28PM
'Roid use was prevalent even in high school, at least my high school. Steroids were easily procured from Mexico since my high school was on a border town, and my high school had a no drug-testing policy (it made their students sign a bullshit statement but never went beyond that).
As a result our football and wrestling teams had Arnold Schwarzenegger-looking motherfuckers who, coincidentally, developed bad acne problems around the time their bodies started filling out.
Steroid use is also a big problem in police departments, it's one of the most well-kept secrets (other than a late-'90s expose in Details magazine) and likely the reason why there are so many violent police overreactions to petty crimes.
As for the Olympics? Fuck it, allow them to do whatever they want, it's their bodies, not mine. We can't force them all to have the same diet and take the same supplements. And while we're at it, let's bring back gladiator fights, pay per view, with a residing official delivering the final thumbs-up/thumbs down (which itself may be a historically inaccurate description of Pollice Verso, but in the age of zooming cameras would lend itself well to the purpose).
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday November 26 2016, @08:11PM
It's my understanding that instead of a thumbs down it was actually the thumb pressed against the chest, representing "do the same with your dagger/sword/etc.". I can't quite see this being a direct representation for a retinarius, who used a trident as his weapon, but it would be reasonably accurate for most of them.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.