George Churchill Individual Essay Sociology SSP325

George Churchill

Sociology SSP325

Marc Lawton

Deviance and the Athlete: Causes in Sports

Society

Due Date: 18th December 2008

Word Count: 2578

Contents Page

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George Churchill Individual Essay Sociology SSP325

1. Introduction 3-5

2. Theories Behind Deviance in Sport 5-6

Conflict and Critical theories

3. Causes of Deviance 6-8

Education System, Overconformity & Gambling

4. Sport Ethic 8-10

Underconformity, Positive Deviance, Varsity Blues & Mary Decker
Slaney

5. Drug Use 10-11

Banned Substances, Tom Simpson & Information Network

6. Conclusion 11-12

7. References 13

8. Appendices 14-17

Deviance and the Athlete: Causes in Sports Society

Introduction

The forms and causes of deviance in sport are so diverse that no

single theory can explain all of them (Blackshaw and Crabbe, 2004). What
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is accepted in sports as the norm may be seen as deviant in other spheres

of society and what is seen as the norm in society can largely be seen as

deviant in sports. Only on a racing track can you drive at speeds over 200

miles per hour at high risk of collision, outside the racing track it would be

seen as a criminal offence. The social vacuum that has been created

around sports is significantly proven to be different from the society we

live in day by day. Deviance in sport can be argued, involves

unquestioned acceptance of what is termed as the norms, when a social

world accepts actions performed as routine and normal.

Actions as such in a sporting society may involve hatred and

physical contact as means of motivation, treatment by coaches and

actions from spectators that would be rejected as the norm in another

social world. Athletes usually commit to accept advice from important

people in their lives without questioning them, and it is overconforming to

these norms that can result in an athlete being too committed to the goals

and norms of sport usually leading to extreme actions.

Throughout their whole careers athletes hear again and again the

need to keep setting new targets, and for them to reach their targets they

need to do whatever it takes and by whatever means possible (Atkinson

and Young, 2008). Historically, deviance in sport has changed shapes.

Links to gambling, throwing a game or match, unsporting behavior,

fighting, taking performance enhancing drugs and a general lack of

respect for rules have always been ubiquitous. New rules and regulations

are always introduced, usually from television and media pressures, and

usually result in tougher punishment for deviant actions. Rio Ferdinand

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was banned for 8 months and fined £50,000 after being found guilty of

missing a drugs test in 2003, although 2 days later he tested negative, the

pressures put on authorities for tougher measures set out to make an

example of a guiltlessathlete. Although Ferdinand was guilty of missing a

test, if the same applied in normal society a person would not be vilified in

the same way.

Blaming television and media may not have justification as these

have not always been as prevalent in the past (Houlihan, 2003). The

emergence of rule changes in any sport is often met with initial hostility.

The rules sometimes discriminate against athletes who conform to

deviate, journalist Paula Parrish stated in 2002:

‘Where do acceptable practices end and cheating begin? Why is it okay for

a cyclist to sleep in an oxygen tent but not okay to inject EPO?’

(Coakley, 1991: 150)

To deviate away from the dominant norms of any society or sport

takes courage and conviction and is often the key part of the process of

change as stated in the conflict theory. From this sense deviance may be

viewed as behavior that transgresses commonly held norms in any culture

or society but it need not be viewed in a negative way (Joovie, 2006).

Causes of sporting deviance carry many arguments, some show early

signs of preferential treatment in high school, making future deviant

actions natural acts for athletes and these will be discussed.

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Theories behind Deviance in Sport

The conflict theory suggests that the violators of rules are the

exploited victims. Groups of people with power are able to manipulate

others to accept their views of the world and any athlete that violates

those norms are seen as deviant. Athletes are seen as the victims of a

profit driven system where the emphasis is placed solely on the success

they achieve and deviance is forced on athletes as a result of the rules

discriminating against them. These rules can cause an athlete to be

deviant to secure sponsorship funds, where only the successful and elite

athletes get sponsored. A limitation behind this deviance is that both

sponsored and non-sponsored athletes are deviant, which ignores how

they identify themselves and what factors drive them to be deviant

(Coakley, 1991).

Critical theory implies that dominant forms of social constructions

can privilege people over others (Blackshaw & Crabbe, 2004). Sport

includes aggression, competition and the pursuit of goals through the use

of performance and technology with the athletes making their own

choices. Although the conflict theory ignores overconformity to rules and

sport ethic, the critical theory involves overconformity and also

underconformity (going against/rejecting the norms). Values in sport

never stay the same as these depend on negotiation, compromise and

coercion but significant evidence in recent times suggest sport can reflect

society and even cause change to society. What the critical theory cannot

determine is when sports produce dominant forms of social relations in

society, although these may be gradual happenings.

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Causes of Deviance

Athletes have historically been given second, third and fourth

chances in sport because of their skills. The preferential treatments

athletes receive don’t just come from coaches, media and spectators but

also unpredictably from the sporting system and even in recent times the

legal system (Joovie, 2006). Best examples of these behaviours are in the

educational system where athletes are usually the subject of higher class

treatment from coaches, teachers and even fellow students. This form of

pampering and favouritism can cause greater departure from cultural

ideals resulting in greater deviance from the athletes, who detach from

normal society and take on a social world likened to a ‘sporting vacuum’

where only other athletes can understand them. Deviance caused

amongst these athletes become social in nature rather than individually

and they become further detached from normal society when they get

less severe punishments then normal people caught performing these

deviant acts (see Appendix A).

The Santana High School tragedy was linked to athletes, this

followed acts of deviant behaviour from athletes who it is believed, started

to believe they were invincible and could do what they wanted and barely

get a slap on the wrist (see Appendix B). Following the shootings,friends

of Williams claimed he was a huge fan of Linkin Park and one of his

favourite tracks contained the lyric ‘Cause I’m one step closer to the edge,

and I’m about to break’. These killings were linked to favouritism shown

towards athletes at the high school and these lyricsshows signs that

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helplessness from a sensitive young individual could have been evident in

his extreme actions. His friend, Alex Ribble, described Williams as a small

geeky boy who was constantly bullied by the school jocks (athletes) and

never stuck up for himself but always swore revenge (Demiro, 2002).

Deviant overconformity can arise from athletes who show eagerness

to be accepted by their peers. To do this they must adopt behaviours that

will be accepted by the other athletes and coaches which can make them

vulnerable to group demands to please these people (see Appendix B).

The highest performing athletes tend to bond the most and detach from

normal society and in some cases create their own rules because they

sense they are unique. As Howard Becker articulated in his study,

Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance:

‘Social groups create deviance by making the rules and then applying

those rules to particular people and labelling them outsiders. This point of

view signifies deviance is not the action committed by the person, but

rather the application by others of the rules and sanctions to an offender.

The deviant is one to whom that label has successfully been applied;

deviant behaviour is behaviour that people so label.

(Becker, 1963: 9)

Off field deviance such as gambling became familiar in the late

1990s. The sports betting market comprises of bets that can be placed at

the venue, in betting shops, over the telephone and over the internet. In

Australia alone the sports betting market has experienced an increased

growth of approximately 12 percent peryear since the mid-1990’s

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(Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1999). The easy access to betting, mainly

from the introduction of online betting in the late 1990’s, has shown

patterns of deviant behaviour amongst athletes. Increased attempts by

players and coaches to influence the outcome of scores have in recent

years undermined the integrity of sports which has created suspicion from

spectators who feel outcomes can be pre-arranged. In 2000, Pakistan’s

Salim Malik and South Africa’s Hansie Cronje were found guilty of

accepting sums of money for allegedly giving information on team morale,

tactics and pitch conditions and other cricketer’s were also implicated in

the scandal.

Sport Ethic

The sport ethics are the norms in sport that are defined by the

dominant groups in sports and consist of rules that set the criteria of

defining an athlete. Athletes that do not conform to these norm set of

rules usually do not last very long in their sport and history can prove this.

George Best did not show the correct attitude and commitment

(underconformity) expected by his coaches and fellow pros and adapted

the behaviour of retreatism (Coakley, 1991). Not only did he give up on

his goals, but also the means to his deviant actions such as partying and

alcoholism led to an early retirement from football.

The sport system in place that defines the norms relate to the addiction

like overconformity to sports that include self injurious overtraining (Nash,

1987), unhealthy eating strategies (Franseen & McCann, 1996) and the

willingness to still compete regardless of pain and injury, which in some

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circumstances can result in athletes getting pain injections (Dimeo, 2007;

Nixon, 1993, 1996; Young and White, 1995). These are identified as

‘positive deviance’ to achieve the success in sport the athletes’ desire.

Positive deviance is overconforming to the norms of sport that consist of

risks (Hughes and Coakley, 1991).

If a deviant athlete becomes successful others will follow, winning

symbolizes progress and establishes distinction (Blackshaw and Crabb,

2004; Jarvie, 2006)). Athletes will accept the risks of injuries and play

through them, this sets an example to other athletes that to pursue

success they must overcome situations and beat the odds. Deviance such

as playing with torn ligaments and having surgery after surgery to

continue competing will occur when these norms are accepted uncritically

unquestioned and are even glorified by those involved in sport such as

coaches, journalists, spectators and sponsors (see Appendix D).

Commentators echo these words and praise such athletes as ‘dedicated to

the game’ and ‘heroes’ (Glifford and Mangel, 1977).

Athletes can be seen as victims of a profit driven business in which

they must conform to or risk losing their ability to earn (Blackshaw &

Crabbe, 2004). Again the conflict theory emphasizes this social order

where athletes are used as robots to profit others. In the movie Varsity

Blue (Tova Laiter Productions, 1999) an American football team isunder

the regime of a coach whose philosophy is ‘win at all costs’. The movie is

based on intercollegiate sports and portrays a compelling incite of

athletes as robots to profit a coach who manipulates the athletes to play

through pain regardless of long term consequence to profit his winning

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statistics (see Appendix C). This health abuse includes using tough

dietary measures to speed up rehabilitation and psychodoping (Coakley,

1992). To overconform means an athlete will usually pursue their dream

without questioning methods and exclude family and health. Successful

American long distance track athlete Mary Decker Slaney’s coach Alberto

Salazar stated in his Guide to Road Racing:

‘The greatest athletes run themselves to death. You have got to have an

obsession, but if unchecked it can become destructive. That’s what it is

with Slaney. She will kill herself unless you pull the reigns back’

(Salazar, 2002)

Training in sports has become medicalised to the point that the

athletes use medical technology in ways to push beyond normative limits

(Beamish and Ritchie, 2006). Slaney was found guilty of failing a

testosterone to epitestosterone test in 1996 during the Atlanta Olympic

trialsat the age of 37. Her age might suggest overconformity to stay

involved in sport for as long as possible. As Slaney was a very successful

athlete who had in her career broken world records in long distance, it is

possible these exhilarating experiences and also those around her may

have contributed to creating a context where taking natural chemicals

such as testosterone seems normal.

Drug Use

Banned substances were not tested for until the Mexico Olympics in

1968, this followed the development of steroids and amphetamines during

the 1940s. One of the most controversial incidents involving banned

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substances occurred in 1967 when British cycling star Tom Simpson died

of exhaustion during the Tour de France. A post mortem revealed he had

taken amphetamines and alcohol and this proved fatal in the heat. Other

substances that have caused controversy include beta blockers, these

slow down the heart rate and were rife in snooker and golf in the 1980s

(Dimeo, 2007).

An athlete has to decide whether to ingest or inject a banned

substance, this is a conscious act where the athlete is fully aware it is an

illegal act in the world of sport (Houlihan, 2003). It is easy to point the

finger towards the athlete and blame their actions solely on their

shoulders, citing it as an act of weakness, but in the modern society we

live in there are influences surrounding the athlete that are making

decisions like these the norm in sport that now include, medicalisation of

sport, public demand for more spectacular performances and culture of

winning values that encourage risks.

Athletes share an information network concerning who is taking drugs,

what they are using, what dosage they use and how they are getting away

with it (Dimeo, 2007). This form of deviance has to be fully considered

before the blame is put on the athlete because of the system of sport we

have created and the choices the athlete makes in light of the

circumstances surrounding them. Interactionism theory explains that an

athlete will learn the norms and expectations in their sport after becoming

associated with a group of other athletes in their sport, but the process of

choice making make this theory limited as the athlete must make a

conscious choice.

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Conclusion

Deviance in sport is more likely to occur when athletes are separated from

the rest of community and get self-indulgent on the idea that they are

extraordinary and unique and above normal people. To prevent deviance

sporting programs need to be put in place for young athletes that cover

drugs, injury, the body, rules of the game and risks associated with

deviant behaviour. There is a need to create new norms within sport to

prevent athletes from entering a ‘sporting vacuum’ and becoming

distanced from normal society. It is crucial to know that athletes are not

the sole perpetrators in deviance, coaches, teachers, administrators,

sponsors, journalists and agents provide a long list of people who engage

deviance in sport. It is important to remember sport is not above society,

it is just a part of society whose sole purpose is to entertain the general

public and those who are elite performers need to be surrounded with

people who can ground people on these norms.

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References
Atkinson, M & Young, K. (2008). Deviance and Social Control in Sport.
Human Kinetics Europe Ltd.

Baker, J. (1999). Varsity Blues. Pocket Books.

Beamish, R & Ritchie, I. (2006). Fastest, Highest, Strongest: a critique of

high performance sport. Routledge.

Blackshaw, T & Crabbe, T. (2004). New Perspectives on Sport and

Deviance: Consumption, Performativity and Social Control. Routledge

Clement, J. (1995). Contributions of the Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu to the

Sociology of Sport. Sociology of Sport Journal. 12, 2: 147-158.

Coakley, J. (1998). Sport in Society: Issues & Controversies. 6th Edition.

Boston: McGraw-Hill.

DeMiro, D. (2002). Too High a Price for Harmony: A Perspective on School

Shootings. AuthorHouse.

Dimeo, P. (2007). A History of Drug Use in Sport 1876-1976: Beyond Good

and Evil. Routledge.

Hasday, J. (2002). Columbine High School Shooting: Student Violence.

Enslow Publishers.

Hines, B. (1968). A Kestral for Knave. London: Penguin.

Horne, J. (2005). Sport in Consumer Culture, Palgrave.

Houlihan, B. (2003). Sport and Society, Sage.
Hughes, R. and Coakley, J. (1991). Positive Deviance Amongst Athletes.
Sociology of Sport Journal. 8: 307-25.
Jarvie, G. (2006). Sport, Culture and Society: An Introduction. Routledge.

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George Churchill Individual Essay Sociology SSP325

Lefkowitz, B. (1997). Our Guys: The Glen Ridge Rape and the Secret Life of
the Perfect Suburb. University of California Press.

Lenk, H. (1981). Sport Achievement & Social Criticism: Handbook of Social

Sciences of Sport. Publishing Co.

Nixon, H. (1993). Accepting the Risks and Pain of Injury in Sport: Mediated
Cutural Influences on Playing Hurt. Sociology of Sport Journal. 10, 2: 183-
196

Polley, M. (1998). Moving the Goalposts: a history of sport and society

since 1945, Routledge

Appendix A

Columbine High School

The Columbine High School massacre occurred on Tuesday, April 20, 1999,

at Columbine High School in Columbine in unincorporated Jefferson

County, Colorado, United States, near Denver and Littleton. Two students,

Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, embarked on a massacre, killing 12

students and a teacher, as well as wounding 23 others, before committing

suicide. It is the fourth-deadliest school shooting in United States history,

after the 1927 Bath School disaster, 2007 Virginia Tech massacre and the

1966 University of Texas massacre, and the deadliest for an American high

school.

During the Columbine situation the two teenagers (reportedly sport

dropouts) began their rampage in the library with the words ‘all jocks

stand up, we will get the guys in the white hats’ and ‘everyone with a

white cap or baseball cap standup’. These were the trademark clothingfor

athletes at the school, or jocks as the attackers referred to them. It is

reported that Columbine was a school that may have favouredthe

athletes. In the run up to the massacre there were incidents such as the

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state wrestling champion parking his car all-day in a 15 minute slot

without being questioned, a football player on probation for burglaryand

sexual harassment from an athlete going unpunished by his teacher who

was also his coach. A feeling of powerlessness, caused by the preferential

treatment of athletes at Columbine, was one reason linked to the actions

of Harris and Klebold.

Appendix B

Santana High School

On Monday, March 5, 2001 at 9:20 a.m., 15-year-old Williams began firing

a .22-caliber revolver in a boy’s bathroom at Santana High School.

Following the shootings an angry reader wrote to the Los Angeles Times

stating:

‘For school personnel to be at a loss as to the motives of the shootings at

Santana High School is hypocritical. Anyone who has attended high school

knows there is the ‘in crowd’ made up of sports heroes, class officers and

their entourage. To this group the teachers and administrators pander

allowing them to do pretty much as they please. Those not in the ‘in

group’ become of the subject of bullying, ridicule and taunting’ (Williams

case).

Leading up to the Santana tragedy a group of high school football players

sexually assaulted a retarded woman with a baseball bat and a broomstick

in the wealthy suburb of Glen Ridge in 1989. The community was unwilling

to believe its beloved high school heroes were responsible. One excuse
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after another was brought forth to spare the athletes, while the victimised

woman was made into the one who coerced them into the act.

Appendix C

Quotes from Varsity Blues movie 1999 give an insight into deviance and

the role the coach plays in sports, the sporting ethic portrayed here is one

of manipulation.

‘You just listened to the coaches and tried as best you could to win’

Lead character Jonathan Mox explaining at the beginning of the movie

how the coach is the most important man in the team and you do what he

says at a costs.

‘You're a gamer, Wendell. Let's do this, you'll be good to go’

This line in the movie comes from the coach Bud Kilmer who tries to

manipulate a young athlete into taking a pain injection so he can finish

the game.

‘Never show weakness, the only pain that matters is the pain you inflict’

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Coach Bud Kilmer explaining to his team it is okay to hurt the opposition

purposefully.

‘I'm amazed he lasted this long. I removed scar tissue from his knee.’

The doctor explaining the extent of the injury suffered by lead star Lance

Harbor who had been manipulated by coach Bud Kilmer into taking pain

injections to play through injury. The cause of the injury was due to his

teammate collapsing and being unable to block the opposing teams

defence, his teammate who collapsed, Billy Bob, was days earlier told by a

nurse he was not fit to play after collapsing in class but coach Bud Kilmer

pressured him into playing regardless of the nurses advice.

Appendix D

Nike Atlantic Olympic Ad Campaign 1996

The sport ethic we have created can cause deviance to overconform, this

ad campaign by Nike in 1996 clearly shows that there is a social world in

sport where only success matters.

‘Whothe Hell Do You Think You Are? Are You An Athlete? Because

if you are then you know what it means to want to be better, to want

to be the best. And if you are then you understand it's not enough to

just want to be the best. You can't just sit around and b******t about how

much you want it. Show me how much you want it. Dare to do what it

takes to be the best. And then, whether you win, lose, or collapse on the

finish line, at worst you willknow exactly who you are. If You Can't

Stand the Heat, Get Out of Atlanta!’

(Sports Illustrated 1996).

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Sponsors, as with coaches, journalists, commentators and agents all

contribute this sporting ethic to athletes who have this sentiment ringing

in their ears everyday of their career. Upon retirement athletes then use

the same terminology when they enter coaching and it causes everlasting

forum of overconformity.

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