Your thoughts on runners with Prosthetics.

[Thunder]

Well, we got this runner who, by all accounts is doing quite well.
Thing is he doesn't have lower legs but has been fitted with carbon fiber blades.

The article that prompted this discussion with my girlfriend :
http://www.sport24.co.za/OtherSport/...-edge-20110724

"
The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) initially banned him from competing in able bodied races after it was found that his blades gave him an unfair advantage.
He took his case to the CAS and was cleared to run shortly before the Beijing Games."


My personal feeling is augmentation , giving him an advantage is wrong, however admirable it is . (my girlfriend thinks he should be allowed to run)


My suggestion , study his running , try to find out the advantage caused by his "blades" and subtract that percentage from his finishing time.


But in thinking about it i tried to find a basic rule for things like athletics and what i thought was anything NOT artificially enhanced should be allowed to compete...


But , then the Castor Semenya story raises it head.

http://www.sportsscientists.com/2009...or-female.html
Totally natural (nothing artificial)but excessive testosterone, giving her an advantage over other female athletes...



Anybody else have different ideas?

[Feuer Frei!]

Well, excessive testosterone and unfair advantage due to the blades on prosthetics are two different things.
I agree with your girlfriend, i think he should be allowed to run, since the CAS cleared him to run. I imagine they would have done their investigations and/or testing to prove no unfair advantage gained? I haven't read the article linked, so i'm going in blind in respect to that part of it.
But, if cleared, why not? Was there a protest from IAAF? If not, case closed. And case closed for future cases, probably.

[Platapus]

That is a difficult and often emotional question to answer.

There was a pro golfer who had the same issue. He had a disability that prevented him from walking long distances so he wanted to use a golf cart. Other golfers complained that walking long distances in this specific tournament was part of the competition and that all golfers had to accept the exertion of walking. To allow this golfer to ride, made him less tired and therefore gave him an advantage.

What would have been the "right" decision for this golfer. I don't know what the "right" answer is.

On one hand people with disabilities garner sympathy and can be given reasonable accommodation as a result of their disablement.

On the other hand, participating in sports is a voluntary action and if one wishes to garner the advantages of participating in a voluntary sport, they have to accept the rules.

I don't know if there is a "right" answer to quandaries like this.

Decide one way and you are a heartless bastage with no compassion for the disabled.

Decide another way and you are unfairly discriminating against non-disabled people who are following the rules of the voluntary sport.

I wish I knew the answer.

[RickC Sniper]

Originally Posted by Platapus

That is a difficult and often emotional question to answer.

There was a pro golfer who had the same issue. He had a disability that prevented him from walking long distances so he wanted to use a golf cart. Other golfers complained that walking long distances in this specific tournament was part of the competition and that all golfers had to accept the exertion of walking. To allow this golfer to ride, made him less tired and therefore gave him an advantage.

If I remember correctly, using a golf cart was against pga rules so it wasn't other golfers complaints that caused his problem. That case was decided by the courts and he was allowed to play and use a cart.

I don't think the runner should be allowed to participate in the olympics or even college sports using the prosthetic legs\feet.

I can picture a legless man/woman wearing a mermaid-like prosthetic and wanting to swim against able bodied individuals. Where do you draw the line?

And I do not believe there could be any test that could tell you EXACTLY what the advantage is.

We do already have competitions for disabled athletes, and classifying an individual's disability in order to make those competitions fair is quite difficult.

[Anthony W.]

I can answer this without emotion! I have friends with prosthetic legs!

I don't think he should be allowed to run. The spring effect alone of the carbon fiber would give him a major advantage.

Its essentially a form of powerbocking. His upper legs don't have to move as far or as fast to go as far.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powerbocking

That is a difficult and often emotional question to answer.

It is simple.
It is the wrong decision.

[Castout]

Ah when the time comes when living with a handicap gives you unfair advantage over those who do not I say that is a hell of a time.

Surely now isn't it yet.

[Skybird]

My grandfather had lost one leg in the war, so I am used to that kind of sight. However, I admit that it violates my natural desire for "normal" sights and paired, balanced limbs, my biologically programmed sense of natural beauty, no matter what the intellect expects me to express in opinion. It will never be a normal sight for me tzo see somebody with one missing eye, I wioll always empotionally react to that breaching of the norm. I will always prefer to see a beautiful womán having two breasts instread of one, and I will allways prefer to see runners running on two legs, not on protheses or using wheelchairs. However, this does not mean I wish to kick them from society or dfiscriminate them. It'S just that the expection from the norm aslways triggers attention and reaction, often an emotionally negative one - and sometimes (though not in this case maybe), such a negativity in empotions is serving vital interests, espoecially from a communal level (think of ancient tribes and primitive people).

I just do not wish to see people with crippled limbs being that obviously displaying themselves to the public. Also, there is an implication, that politically is wanted of course, but to which I object, that is that it does not make a difference whether you have two, one, or no legs. It makes, you can twist and turn that and call "injustice" as long as you want - take away his two items called protheses, and then see what a difference it makes. The lack of difference between being "halthy" and "crippled", is true for other qualkities. Intellectual ones, for example. Loosing a leg does not automatically make oyu dumb, or bright. On empotions, I already would be careful, for loosing a liomb can have an emotional impact on a person for sure that maybe will last and chnage his behaviour or character for the better or worse.

The point is to accept the presence of differences, but not to deny them neither to discriminate against them. If crippled atheletes want to compete, then let them, but I do not wish to see their disability being raised to the level of the design-by-norm, nor their competition being mixed with that of "full-membered", "normal" people.

I said that on the homosexual debate, and I say it again here: accept them, let them fit into normal life and do not discriminate against them - but stop making a hassle over them as if by their special characteristic they had turned into something m ore special than those people that in a natural-statistical understanding simply are normal. The guy in this example went to court for his right to compete with normal atheletes. To me, he could as well sue somebody over that he has no wings to fly with, or that he has had an event in his life that costed him two legs. It is kind of absurd to me.

And the one guy this thread started about, obviously he is a different kind of runner than is somebody with two biological legs. Two artifical legs of the kind he uses, are not what two biological legs are. If you compare two such atheletes to each other, you compare two different things to each other. This of course should be rejected - that is why interest groups make it such a big thing. But if you allow this, you can start to introduce formulas by which to calculate in what way the time swom by an athlete in the bassin compares to the time run by another athlete on the track. Then you can have hurdle runners, mid range runners, sprinters and swimmer all compete with each other in just one race! Great, eh?! In the end it becomes a competition of pocket calculators - and then the background anaylsis, and finally the court proceedings over what analysis and expertise is valid and which ine is not, and why...

No doubt atheletes making it to international competitions have trained formidably and show some formidable physical performances. The guy here probably runs the track much fastetr than I was able to do, ever. But that means nothing. He is better in this, in another discipline I probably am better than he is. He did and trained his thing, I learned and practised other things. So what? Where is the surprise? Leave the audience the choice what it wants to see and what not, and do not start to compare apples with opranges. And the hell, leave political correctness and interest groups' sociological agendas out of it. Want to see wheelchar races and ball games, and runners with one or no legs, then go to such a sporting event. But do not push it down people'S throat that they have to watch it when they go to a normal sporting event, no matter whether they want to see that or not. It is two different things.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Castout

Ah when the time comes when living with a handicap gives you unfair advantage over those who do not I say that is a hell of a time.

Surely now isn't it yet.

There are quota rules in place or under preparation in Germany, I am not certain, wehre if you search for a job and talk to an employer you can have a better qualification than somebody else, but you lose to him because he has a handicap that falls under that kind of legislation.

We also are getting women quotas, and migrant quotas. The latter is already decided and practiced in at least one German federal state since shortly, the first is practically decided as well. And the EU wants all that anyway, so if the German attempts fail, the people say no or the parliament rejects it (unlikely anyway), it will be imposed upon us anyway.

Quotas are discrimination. Always. And not against just the one, but against all.

[Castout]

Originally Posted by Skybird

There are quota rules in place or under preparation in Germany, I am not certain, wehre if you search for a job and talk to an employer you can have a better qualification than somebody else, but you lose to him because he has a handicap that falls under that kind of legislation.

We also are getting women quotas, and migrant quotas. The latter is already decided andpracticed in at least one German federal state, the latter is practically decided as well. And the EU wants all that anyway, so if the German attempts fail, it will be imposed upon us anyway.

Quotas are discrimination. Always. And not against just the one, but against all.

Ah. State sanctioned discrimination. Sounds horrific.

[THE_MASK]

The guy has no lower legs for god sakes . Let him run with the able bodied runners and beat them all

The guy has no lower legs for god sakes .

so what?

Let him run with the able bodied runners and beat them all

If a person with no legs at all can easily beat the time of the fastest Kenyan in a marathon should he be in the same race category?

There are quota rules in place or under preparation in Germany, I am not certain, wehre if you search for a job and talk to an employer you can have a better qualification than somebody else, but you lose to him because he has a handicap that falls under that kind of legislation.

You are not certain because it is bull, it works the other way round you cannot employ a person if the other candidate is better qualified for the job but but disabled......unless of course it comes under the many loopholes where you can turn the better qualified but disabled person down.
There is of course another aspect which you are obviousy confusing into your imaginary one, and that is where under certain terms and conditions there are two equally qualified candidates and only one position.

Ah. State sanctioned discrimination. Sounds horrific.

Skybird is on about the EU and evil german government....as a basic rule when you get those words together it is time stop and think a minute before you swallow it Castout as 9 times out of 10 it isn't really going to be true.

[Thomen]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

You are not certain because it is bull, it works the other way round you cannot employ a person if the other candidate is better qualified for the job but but disabled......unless of course it comes under the many loopholes where you can turn the better qualified but disabled person down.
There is of course another aspect which you are obviousy confusing into your imaginary one, and that is where under certain terms and conditions there are two equally qualified candidates and only one position.

I am not certain which is more amazing.. you utter lack of knowledge, your ignorance, or your hate for Skybird.

Sky, btw is correct when he said that there is a quota for disabled persons, and that these have to be given first consideration. The state of Westphalia has these rules (based on federal law) in place for over 20 years. The addition of migrant workers is just an addendum to what already is in place.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Thomen

Sky, btw is correct when he said that there is a quota for disabled persons, and that these have to be given first consideration. The state of Westphalia has these rules (based on federal law) in place for over 20 years. The addition of migrant workers is just an addendum to what already is in place.

The red-red senate in Berlin also has put or wants to put into effect a migrants quota for public services in Berlin, something that the Greens and most of the lefts/socialists want to do on national level, too, even parts of the CDU.

A women quota is being openly threatened by even the current government, consisting of comedians from the former conservative and libertarian parties CDU and FDP.Many successful business women nevertheless speak out against such quotes, calling them counterproductive, discriminating (against women!, because it implies that as women they cannot qualify by themselves for offices), and damaging to companies who may be forced to accept second choice personell for key offices only, due to quota demands.

Especially insane Green politicians like Roth and Ströbele also occasionally demand (repeatedly until today) that Turkish becomes second official language of Germany, equally beside German. Two or three years ago he even demanded the national anthem shall be sung in German and in Turkish, too. While isolated on the second demand, he has quite some support from the Greens and Reds for his first proposal. Green chief demagogues Trittin and Roth also declared that for their party, pushing foreign migrants into germany is just a weapon to win elections by importing their electorate from foreign countries, and that once that they have consoldiated their power that way they want to use iot to destroy the Germaness of Germany. "The more Germany becomes less German, the more I will like it", said either Roth or Trittin on a public appearance. - They never were confronted or challenged about their calls for the deconstruction of Germany. Both are members of the >German< parliament.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Skybird

"The more Germany becomes less German, the more I will like it"

And you have that in your government ?