In fact two of them! Almost every year now one of our athletes is busted for doping. This is not news anymore. Experts warn that if this trend continues, the public may begin to experience ‘news fatigue,’ a condition where headlines are met with eye-rolls, sighs and the phrase ‘Tell me when something actually happens.’ The announcement was met with the same level of shock as discovering that politicians enjoy lying and cats hate water. Media outlets have stopped writing new doping scandal scripts. ‘We just copy-paste the last one,’ admitted a producer. ‘Insert name, sport, banned substance, and tearful apology. Boom — done before lunch.’ Usually the athlete will release a statement that goes something to this effect like: ‘My fans, my team, the esteemed members of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), I am today, utterly heartbroken, to address this completely unprecedented and, frankly, baffling situation. Let me be perfectly clear: I have never intentionally taken a performance-enhancing substance.’
At this point we the fans want to believe him/her. We start saying things like • ‘He’s never even seen a needle.” • ‘He’s built differently. Like...maybe he’s part cheetah’ • ‘He only drinks water blessed by Daddy Bushiri.’ How could they even accuse the poor athlete of such a heinous transgression? We start suspecting a Western plot to stifle African competition through unfounded allegations.
