The Hitch said:
Nope. Those are your standards. Just because you view cycling and sport in that romantic fashion, doesn't mean anyone else has to.
The definition of hypocrisy is not - doing things that go against martinvickers' view on life and sport.
Others are perfectly capable of having their own opinions, attitudes etc, and it is on a person's own attitude that hypocrisy is judged, not on yours Martin.
It's not judged on anybody's individual standards, Hitch - you don't get to decide if you are a hypocrit, it's an external reality, not a personal feeling.
Cycling, like almost all sports, presents an external reality that all the riders are aware of, regardless of their personal 'in-the-know' feelings. Doping deliberately perverts that purpose for profit. It's hypocritical.
Don't make the classic arrogant person's mistake of claiming everyone else has to follow your standards. They don't. A cyclist who doesn't view the sport in your romantic way, but merely as a competion where doping is part of the game, is absolutely not a hypocrite if they dope.
I'll take your advice on avoiding arrogance seriously, as the lessons from the master.
Oh Lord.
As far as making a play for the moral highground,
I feel you may have overshot this one a tad
Feel what you like. I'll toss it in the bin marked 'irrelevant'.
Not to mention that its not like you don't support dopers. Tyson Gay for example, who you defended? What, fans who shut their ears and repeat "never tested positive" are not enabling doping?
Gay? That would be Gay who
I argued had to be banned? Try not to let your own biases against me blind you to what I actually argue. It makes you look like an idiot.
The evidence that Gay was reckless/criminally stupid as opposed to consciously malign is considerable, from several sources. You can choose to disbelieve it, and that's fine, but it says more about you and your cynicism than any actual looking at the evidence.
Despite which evidence, of course, I still argued, immediately, for a ban! Frankly, it ought to be a life ban - even at it's best, that level of recklessness has to be discouraged or the place goes up in smoke. And rest assured, while I was disappointed for the man to be beaten in 2012 by Gatlin, for obvious reasons, I couldn't give tuppence now, save one thing - at least Gay is coughing up names.
As for fans shouting "never tested positive" - where are they? Armstrong said it endlessly, it was a mantra of his. His fans repeated it, absolutely - but can you point me to many fan statements with those words today?
Take me, for instance, god help you. I'm on record, on this forum. I don't believe in Froome, on balance. I think, personally, he's doped to the gills. MY hunch is that the 'badzilla' gave him a free slate to mess with his blood passport permanantly and it'll be monstrously hard to catch him if that's true. I don't believe in 2000 odd posts here I've ever suggested "never tested positive" was a defence. I have argued for logic, due process and evidence over snitty speculation, not just for Froome, but all athletes - shoot me.
Prior to the release of his book, he seemed a pleasant enough guy though, especially compared to Wiggins, and I think i said that "I'd be happy to be proved wrong".
As it happens, his book makes him look like an absolute c***, and actually increases my sympathy a small amount for Wiggins - his unpleasant paranoid behaviour towards Froome now appears, in retrospect, completely justified. So frankly, I hope he's caught.
Which still doesn't mean though that I think he's been caught yet. Frankly, some of his detractors are almost as unpleasant as him - it's hard to choose between them.
But don't let facts get in the way of trying to make me the silly stereotype you like to take potshots at.
Not to mention if the Sky ever falls, your unwavering defense for a team that was doping, would, by your own standards, count as significant "blood on your hands".
Of course, the unwavering defence line is snitty boll0x, but we'll let it go and take the point on principle. Blood on your hands comes from being an accessory to the doping, by cheering the doper KNOWING he's a doper. There's no way to be an accessory unknowingly, so no, even on its own merits the silly snitty little line makes no sense. If, as I suspect, Froome is a doper, and he brings down Sky, you'll see no tears from me.
And for proof of my consistency, look up my thoughts on Rio Ferdinand, as a mufc fan.
I'll be leaving this site soon, almost certainly, much to the delight, no doubt, of some of the ****tier elements of the forum. The glee with which the subject is treated by some of those elements, especially since some of the saner voices have been hounded out just tires me out. It's certainly not a moral position in any sense.
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