Steroids: A Proposal for the Future Steroids have long been a topic of concern not just in the athletic community, but also in the medical community. If steroids were legalized, then more research could be done to make them safer and more effective in both the medical aspect and the physical aspect. Ryan Ward believes that “the side effects of these drugs (steroids) are much less severe than those from smoking or drinking. People have been taking these drugs (steroids) for more than 40 years. Yet we haven’t seen the landslide of heart attacks and cancer deaths predicted by the steroids Cassandra’s.” (1) As for the few side effects and fatalities, those may have been prevented if steroids were legalized because there would be more research, and steroids would be improved. Although steroids are criminalized much more than alcohol or tobacco, alcohol and tobacco have a much larger number of fatalities. Smoking, as we all know, even harms those around the smoker via second hand smoke. Does that seem fair? Steroids are of no harm to others, only to the person who is using them. Some steroid users believe that they will live longer as a result of properly taking steroids. The ones who will die of steroid use are the bodybuilders who take them incorrectly and get too big. Most athletes, on the other hand, have learned how to use steroids correctly, and as a result may have actually prolonged their lives. Whenever the subject about steroids in sports is brought up, the word “cheating” is always used. Steroids, though, have made sports more exciting. In baseball, steroids have been the cause of more homeruns, more stolen bases, and faster pitches. In football, more records have been broken than ever before, and in track and field the same can be said. If the fact that steroids have made sports more exciting cannot be accepted, then the sporting leagues can drug-test their players; therefore, steroids would only be use for recreational and medicinal purposes. Steroids have...