Coercion refers to threatening a person’s welfare interests to gain their compliance, and involves p

Internet Explorer 6 was released 12 years ago in 2001. It's outdated software that doesn't support car rental in san jose costa rica web standards and exposes your computer to security issues. Even Microsoft discourages its use today .
Had Lance Armstrong nudged one of his Tour de France rivals car rental in san jose costa rica over the edge of the Alpe d'Huez car rental in san jose costa rica he would have likely received a less hostile response than he has in recent weeks for breaking a simple sports rule.
Had Lance Armstrong nudged one of his Tour de France rivals over the edge of the Alpe d'Huez he would have likely received a less hostile response than he has in recent weeks for breaking a simple sports rule.
And we should remember that's what the furore is essentially about: a professional cyclist took substances that were banned by sporting organisations, thereby breaking (repeatedly and with deception) a sporting rule.
Early last week, I listened to callers to a local radio station defending the decision by Nike to drop its sponsorship of Armstrong, while retaining the sponsorship car rental in san jose costa rica of Tiger Woods. Callers were adamant that all Woods had done was cheat (repeatedly and with deception) on his wife.
It's important to repeat that Woods remains a golfer car rental in san jose costa rica after cheating on his wife. Michael Vick , another athlete currently car rental in san jose costa rica sponsored by Nike, has returned to the NFL with the Philadelphia Eagles after going to jail for his part in an illegal dog-fighting ring.
In his review of sport philosophy literature, Roberts made two observations that are pertinent to the hysteria surrounding Armstrong. The first was that cheating car rental in san jose costa rica in sport is now synonymous with drug-taking.
Roberts considered that there were no other rule violations in sport that carry the same moral judgement that an athlete is of bad character. I would add that, perhaps in modern times, forms of vilification and gambling against your own team may also carry this sanction.
The second observation is directly related car rental in san jose costa rica to the first. Roberts argued that a shift had occurred at some stage in the history of most sports whereby athletes no longer had a moral obligation to follow rules for "the good of the game", but instead used a cost-benefit analysis towards rules. He described this orientation to sport in the following way:
If rules are understood by athletes, car rental in san jose costa rica coaches, officials, and fans not to prohibit certain actions but simply to identify those for which there are associated penalties, then, by definition, it becomes very difficult, if not impossible, for athletes to cheat.
Penalties become not the punishment for cheating, but simply the price for performing certain actions permitted car rental in san jose costa rica and costed by the rules. The immoral connotations associated with wilful rule violation, what used to be called cheating, may have been replaced with perfectly acceptable and sensible cost accounting.
The easiest way to demonstrate this cost accounting is by case study. When the Australian rules footballers of the 1980s determined that the cost for deliberately slowing down the play-on style of their opponents after a mark or free kick was only a 15-metre penalty, and the benefit of slowing the opponent down far outweighed this cost, those footballers chose to deliberately break this rule and accept the penalty.
They did so with no regard to how the game should be played: the decision was about maximising their teams' chances of winning. In 1988, the response by the organising body, the Victorian car rental in san jose costa rica Football League, was to impose a harsher penalty.
The interesting thing is that athletes car rental in san jose costa rica across the world are conditioned to approach rules in this way. Watch the NBA any night and you will see defenders deliberately break a rule, and foul to prevent any breakaway layup.
I am going to assume, despite the lack of a confession from Armstrong, that he knowingly engaged in illegal performance-enhancing techniques during his cycling career. Further, I am going to assume that he made the type of cost-benefit analysis that Roberts suggests is common to all deliberate rule violations in sport.
So Armstrong car rental in san jose costa rica decides the benefits of using performance-enhancing methods, including increasing the potential for winning races and the prize money and endorsements that go with Tour victories, outweighed the costs of potential health damage car rental in san jose costa rica and the types of bans imposed by WADA , USADA and the UCI at the time.
To take this accounting analogy one step further, car rental in san jose costa rica the cyclists who were supposedly coerced by Armstrong and his team into engaging in similar methods of doping also made a cost-benefit analysis that demonstrates why any allegation of coercion is utterly out of place here.
Coercion refers to threatening a person's welfare interests to gain their compliance, and involves placing a person in a situation where he or she has no viable option but to comply. Given the generous welfare systems that most countries have, losing a professional cycling job is not a welfare interest.
It is important, particularly to those who have suffered real coercive conditions, that we don't misrepresent pressure as coercion. Those other cyclists decided that the benefits of remaining associated with Armstrong's team outweighed the costs of losing a spot on that team.
Would Armstrong car rental in san jose costa rica have made the decision to dope at the time if he had realised that the costs were this high? Moreover, is it fair to punish Armstrong with these penalties now, when the penalties were different at the time of his rule violation?
Without condoning drug-taking, or other forms the activity formerly know as cheating but now known as cost-benefit accounting, this article actually does capture some important truths and makes some ethically profound points. I particularly car rental in san jose costa rica like the Woods example because it leads to the notion that to get a competitive advantage in golf, one should set up an opponent to repeatedly cheat on their spouse and then make it public because Woods' game really went down hill after the revelations - call it a long term investment. The kind of condemnation dished out to Armstrong, who was one among many making car rental in san jose costa rica the cost-benefit calculation and arriving at the drug taking conclusion has been bordering on hysterical.
Michael please correct me if I am wrong, but it seems the main points of your article were that Armstrong cheated because the potential car rental in san jose costa rica benefits were greater than the potential car rental in san jose costa rica consequences and that his team mates were not coerced to dope due to the benefits to themselves. Further, that we should expect athletes to cheat due to the benefit.
Michael please correct me if I am wrong, but it seems the main points of your article were that Armstrong cheated because the potential benefits were greater than the potential consequences and that his team mates were not coerced to dope due to the benefits to themselves. Further, that we should expect athletes to cheat due to the benefit.
I dont think this is realistic. From reading the entire USADA report, it seems that many of the confessed dopers and many of Armstrongs other contemporaries did not like doping and decided to stop doing so when pressure was not applied by Armstrong or Bruyneel.
I doubt that most pro cyclists persue their sport for the sake of money. Most aspiring pros train constantly and live of precious little while they sacrifice education or careers to pursue the love of their sport. Then the few that make it to the Protour mostly earn very little as professional atheletes, with only the likes of Armstrong, Evans and Wiggins earning car rental in san jose costa rica the big dollars. So the notion that athletes cheat simply for the sake of money missrepresents the motivations of athletes.
I work for a cycling team, I find it amazing that so many athletes car rental in san jose costa rica on Australia's National Road Series would drop further education and seriously narrow their career options by dedicating their lives to the bike. Young athletes really do decicate car rental in san jose costa rica everything to suceed in their sport, they really car rental in san jose costa rica cannot see past bike racing and notice other potential careers. Furthermore, welfare is not generous in Australia. So when you reconsider being a 21 year old in Europe, far from home, being told to take drugs by your team dirrector otherwise you loose your contract.... Suddenly it does look a lot like coercion.
In regards to bad behaviour from other athletes, I do agree that it is amazing that others are not punished. I think the level of outrage against Armstrong is probably related to his high profile and continued car rental in san jose costa rica lying. Although I shake my head at Tiger Woods, I've never had the man lie to me and ask for donations to a charity that spends most of its money on self promotion and management.
Another issue surrounding Armstrongs actions would be the spirit of sport. Armstrong was not just someone who broke the rules but did what was acceptable car rental in san jose costa rica in the peleton, but after the 1998 Festina scandal he lead the way in sophisticated car rental in san jose costa rica doping. I would say that comparing time wasting in football to Armstrongs doping program is a false analogy. Time wasting is annoying and ungentlemanly car rental in san jose costa rica but is probably equivalent to attacking while someone car rental in san jose costa rica is having a pee. What Armstrong did is more like eye gouging behind the play, every game, for 8 years.
Finally, the furore around Armstrong isnt just about Armstrong. It is more about the deep levels car rental in san jose costa rica of corruption in cycling that go all the way to the top of the UCI. Armstrong just happened to be neatly tied up in it all.
We know that humans come in a huge variety of shapes, sizes and abilities. Is it fair if a huge eleven-yr-old competes with a tiny one? Is it fair if someone has genetically car rental in san jose costa rica big muscles, or large feet, or more or less fast fibres in their muscles?
Thought provoking and interesting article. However, Armstrong is just one man, and the framework of what is going on is much larger. Several organizations are part of that equation, UCI, WADA, USADA, CAS, IOC, and the Amaury Sport Organisation. Each has some agenda of their own, which really means incompatible interests, car rental in san jose costa rica and different levels of influence. For example, what is astonishing car rental in san jose costa rica to me is that USADA/WADA ascension to power i