In 1889, a baseball player by the name of Pud Galvin was the first player to openly use performance enhancing drugs in a game. He performed so well that the next day the local newspapers said of Galvin’s performance “the best proof yet furnished the value of discovery” (Smith). How is it that one hundred years later society sees this as an immoral act or cheating? Some may say that performance enhancing drugs are the vice around the virtue. A utilitarian may say that the benefit of the whole in this case outweighs the benefit of the few. I intend to explore these angles throughout this paper and will show sufficient evidence that performance enhancing drugs are not as immoral or unethical as one may have thought.
Our good friend Aristotle thought all virtues were means between two vices. A virtue (or a vice), according to Aristotle, is “a trait of character manifested in habitual action.” As a baseball player, a good virtue is to be a good hitter. Well, to be honest your vice is probably steroid addiction. This is not poor virtues because it is virtuous to be a good hitter in baseball and it is only natural to do all you can to be a great hitter. Therefore, it is virtuous to be a baseball player who uses performance enhancing drugs.
One or many skeptics may reply to this by saying that ethically, cheating is wrong and does not make a good virtue. The skeptics may say that a good virtue is a quality characteristic to have that makes you good at something or helps you contribute well to society. Additionally, using drugs in a public role that younger people look to for guidance is not only a bad virtue but creates bad virtues in others.
My response to the skeptics about the argument of virtue ethics and performance enhancing drugs is that the argument for the virtue ethics and performance enhancing drugs is that virtue ethics does not give a decisive answer to this moral issue. Yet it shines light on the matter that sometimes in order to have a virtuous life you need a vice or two in order to live ethically. The virtue of being a good hitter does not just come naturally, yet a vice like performance enhancing drugs gives a baseball player a virtuous life in baseball.
The utilitarian would say, if steroids are legal in baseball than everyone benefits from it. If every player is allowed to use performance enhancing drugs and if 85% of players are using steroids, then the average number of runs per game increases, which is good for the league and the fans. The players would produce at a higher rate, which would have a higher salary pay out for the players and would extend the player’s careers due to consistent production, which would benefit the owners of teams and the players themselves. This would also benefit the fans as they see longer careers from more players that they like. A utilitarian would say it is immoral not to use steroids due the fact that everyone is benefiting from the use of performance enhancing drugs.
A skeptic would reply to that by saying you cannot just pass something off as moral because it benefits a majority of society. In the end, performance enhancing drugs, like steroids, have harmful effects and people must not be encouraged to use them. Also, if performance enhancing drugs benefit the majority of the baseball society, it is easy to forget that steroids and other performance enhancing drugs, like human growth hormones, are so detrimental to the health of the human body. A skeptic would say, something like this is not moral and cannot be encouraged among baseball teams or anyone for that matter.
My response to the skeptics of the utilitarian argument for the morality of performance enhancing drugs in baseball is that the revenue increase and the expected heightened interest in baseball would only benefit everyone. With a higher interest in baseball, jobs like media, public relations, vending, merchandizing, and advertising will start to see healthy growth projections, which benefits everyone that has an interest in a healthy economy. Media jobs will grow in smaller baseball markets and in national press, because with more interest in baseball brings the demand for information. In merchandizing, interest will spawn the increase in sales of team apparel and the more the demand there is for the apparel, the more money that is made for the several companies that made the material that makes the apparel. This in return helps the economy, which helps everyone. With the growth of interest in smaller baseball markets, the attendance will rise and the ownership of the teams will count on a higher average attendance and will buy more food from companies. In return the ownership of the teams will need to hire more ballpark venders to distribute the higher amount of food for the larger number of fans attending the baseball game. With the higher interest in the game would bring about more media attention, which would bring about the demand for more help in public relations for baseball teams. Also, advertising benefits from performance enhancing drugs due the interest it brings to the game. The game will become more marketable and bring more options for baseball players sponsoring companies and products. A baseball team like the Houston Astros, who have not performed very well the last few years, has led to the decrease in fan attention and attendance. Even Major League Baseball has lost interest in the Houston Astros. With performance enhancing drugs, the Houston Astros would have more players who hit for power and average, which would make the team a marketable sponsor. This makes money for the Houston Astros and companies who did not otherwise have a viable sponsor.
Adding on to the previous, when you add all the domino effects of the use of performance enhancing drugs in baseball, which all start with the increase in interest in the game, you can see that most, if not all, of the benefits lead to an increase in revenue. When the revenue starts to increase for teams in smaller-markets like Oakland, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, Seattle, and Arizona, you start to see more competitive games throughout the league. The amount of losing teams start to decrease and the average number of wins per season for teams individually start to hang close to 81 wins, which is a .500 winning percentage (50%). The increase in revenue makes this happen because these teams can hang on to their good players longer and can afford to get players in free agency when they need them. As you can see, the needs of the many, outweighs the needs of the few.
From virtue ethics to utilitarianism, performance enhancing drugs are a necessary vice for a virtuous baseball life, which tells us that performance enhancing drugs are okay in the eyes of a virtue ethicist. It is immoral to not use performance enhancing drugs when taking society as a whole into consideration, our answer for performance enhancing drugs from a utilitarian’s view tells us that it is wrong not to use these types of drugs in baseball.
Chapman's Corner 