Tuesday 11 August 2015

“Sport’s Dirtiest Secret”: IAAF's Doping Scandal: Worldview and the Culture of Cheating


Canadian sprinter Ben Johnston was not the only doped runner. Image courtesy of Bandeetdesign, Creative Commons.



Joel Kontinen

How the mighty have fallen!” (2 Samuel 1:27, NIV).

We used to think that only a few rogue types would succumb to cheating in athletics but obviously we were wrong. The Sunday Times and German broadcaster ARD/WDR published data that have caused consternation for sports fans, the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada), and probably also caused a few athletes to loose their sleep.

Here’s the BBC’s summary of the findings:

· A third of medals (146, including 55 golds) in endurance events at the Olympics and World Championships between 2001 and 2012 were won by athletes who have recorded suspicious tests. It is claimed none of these athletes have been stripped of their medals.
· More than 800 athletes – one in seven of those named in the files – have recorded blood tests described by one of the experts as ‘highly suggestive of doping or at the very least abnormal’
.”

Just when the sporting world had begun to recover from FIFA’s bribery scandal, we got to know about another, more serious case of cheating.

They haven’t fared much better in other areas: Scientific misconduct is rampant, and Planned Parenthood’s heinous crimes have tarnished its reputation beyond repair.

Could all this say something about our times and the world we’re living in? I suspect it does. If we believe that no one sees us and that we’re not accountable to anyone, we’ll be more prone to do things we otherwise wouldn’t.

But the supernatural realm is real. Whether we acknowledge it or not, God our Creator sees us and knows what we do. Like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, many try to hide from Him, but they cannot.

He came to seek and find the ones who were lost.

Source:

Roan, Dan. 2015. Leaked IAAF doping files: Wada 'very alarmed' by allegations. BBC (2 August).