Pro gamers and drugs

I just read an article on DailyTech and thought I should write my thoughts here. Its been known for a long time that some professional sports athletes use performance enhancing drugs. One recent accusation comes to mind is Roger Clemens, a famous Major League Baseball or MLB player who used to play for the Toronto Blue Jays (I’m from Toronto so that’s how I know him, not that I watch a lot of baseball though), using these drugs.

Back to pro gaming.

Whether its illegal drugs like marijuana, amphetamines or any other ones that I don’t know of, or legal ones such as caffeine pills or sodas. Even if it doesn’t “boost” your gaming skills while in effect, it is still harmful to one’s body. And if these drugs do prove to enhance gamers’ ability to play better then there is an unfair advantage to those that can afford these drugs. As mentioned in the DailyTech article, one immediate and obvious solution that comes to mind is drug testing. But this solution is very expensive to implement in the pro gaming industry.

If money is the problem for implementing this solution, should the Government get involved? This is public health related after all. Since gaming has become a profession, I believe it should be taken look into more seriously like any other business or profession.

This entry was posted on Saturday, August 30th, 2008 at 4:06 pm