Climb01742
07-03-2004, 04:16 AM
ok, right up front i'll admit, as the jerk says, i have no clue what its really like to be a pro racer in europe. and i'm honestly not trying to judge whether they are right or wrong.
but what i do believe is wrong is asserting that cycling is a separate ethical universe.
here are two situations i do know about, first hand...
in junior year in high school i took chemistry. it was spring semester. i was failing chemistry. staring an F in the face. my teacher, guidance counselor and parents said an F would screw my chances of getting into a good college. so i better "buckle down". its hard to remember accurately how big of a deal it was to a 17 year old to get into a "good" college. folks made it seem like if you didn't, life as you knew it would end. kids were cheating on exams left and right. test papers were floating around everywhere. i was trying my *ss off to get chemistry. i was totally buckled down. but i was, and still am to this day, a total idiot about science in general, and chemistry in particular. i had an F written all over my future. so what did i do?
cut to present day. with two partners, i'm running a small business. 3 years old, about 35 people. if this business fails, i'm screwed. totally screwed. everything i have (except my bikes :p ) are tied up in this business. as any business person knows, and faces every day, there are tons of ways to cheat if you own a business. cook the books. over charge clients. subtly screw your employees out of salary or benefits. cut under the table deals with suppliers. get a shady accountant. as the talking heads said, when it comes to my life, my mortgage, my alimony payments, my daughters schooling, how this business turns out ain't no party, ain't no disco, ain't no foooling around. as literally as any pro's financial life is on the line, mine is too. so do i cheat?
look, i ain't noble, i ain't a saint. i've done stuff i ain't proud of. i'm not holding myself up as holier than thou. but my mother and father pounded two things into my ethical soul...you don't quit and you don't cheat. they were both children of the rural south in the depression. they grew up with less than nothing. you ain't seen poor till you've seen poor in the south in the 1930s. they lived walker evans photographs and james agee words. but they worked themselves, and thank heavens me, into the middle class. they did it the old fashioned way, the way millions of poor americans always have. hard, honest work.
growing up, i thought my folks were hard *sses. they were tough. today, and every day, i thank them for being so tough, so unyielding. you don't quit and you don't cheat. i got an F in chemistry. somehow i got into a good college, probably because they had a sense of humor and had a quota for serious under achievers. and my partners and i are running a honest business.
by living example, i was taught that if you don't earn something the right way, its just not worth it. that's how i try to live every day. again, i ain't bragging or nothing. i'm thankful. if my daughter comes to me someday, staring an F in the face, and says all the other kids in school are cheating, and wants to know if that makes cheating ok, i'll know what to tell her. not because i'm a brainiac, or a saint, but because i had good parents. if my daughter grows up without an ethical compass, it won't be your fault, or society's, or TV's, or the internet's, or her teachers, or politician's...i'll be mine.
you don't quit. and you don't cheat. thanks, mom and dad. and someday little sophie, you're welcome.
but what i do believe is wrong is asserting that cycling is a separate ethical universe.
here are two situations i do know about, first hand...
in junior year in high school i took chemistry. it was spring semester. i was failing chemistry. staring an F in the face. my teacher, guidance counselor and parents said an F would screw my chances of getting into a good college. so i better "buckle down". its hard to remember accurately how big of a deal it was to a 17 year old to get into a "good" college. folks made it seem like if you didn't, life as you knew it would end. kids were cheating on exams left and right. test papers were floating around everywhere. i was trying my *ss off to get chemistry. i was totally buckled down. but i was, and still am to this day, a total idiot about science in general, and chemistry in particular. i had an F written all over my future. so what did i do?
cut to present day. with two partners, i'm running a small business. 3 years old, about 35 people. if this business fails, i'm screwed. totally screwed. everything i have (except my bikes :p ) are tied up in this business. as any business person knows, and faces every day, there are tons of ways to cheat if you own a business. cook the books. over charge clients. subtly screw your employees out of salary or benefits. cut under the table deals with suppliers. get a shady accountant. as the talking heads said, when it comes to my life, my mortgage, my alimony payments, my daughters schooling, how this business turns out ain't no party, ain't no disco, ain't no foooling around. as literally as any pro's financial life is on the line, mine is too. so do i cheat?
look, i ain't noble, i ain't a saint. i've done stuff i ain't proud of. i'm not holding myself up as holier than thou. but my mother and father pounded two things into my ethical soul...you don't quit and you don't cheat. they were both children of the rural south in the depression. they grew up with less than nothing. you ain't seen poor till you've seen poor in the south in the 1930s. they lived walker evans photographs and james agee words. but they worked themselves, and thank heavens me, into the middle class. they did it the old fashioned way, the way millions of poor americans always have. hard, honest work.
growing up, i thought my folks were hard *sses. they were tough. today, and every day, i thank them for being so tough, so unyielding. you don't quit and you don't cheat. i got an F in chemistry. somehow i got into a good college, probably because they had a sense of humor and had a quota for serious under achievers. and my partners and i are running a honest business.
by living example, i was taught that if you don't earn something the right way, its just not worth it. that's how i try to live every day. again, i ain't bragging or nothing. i'm thankful. if my daughter comes to me someday, staring an F in the face, and says all the other kids in school are cheating, and wants to know if that makes cheating ok, i'll know what to tell her. not because i'm a brainiac, or a saint, but because i had good parents. if my daughter grows up without an ethical compass, it won't be your fault, or society's, or TV's, or the internet's, or her teachers, or politician's...i'll be mine.
you don't quit. and you don't cheat. thanks, mom and dad. and someday little sophie, you're welcome.