How do we know that what we believe to be true … is really true? What if some truths we’ve come to firmly believe are distortions, like reflections in a fun house mirror – mere illusions, created and maintained by those who benefit from our misplaced trust? Could such a thing happen in America? Would we let it happen?

It has happened. On one subject –anabolic steroids – what passes for common knowledge has little connection to reality. But we’ve been manipulated to believe it, and it’s in the interests of certain influential forces to keep the illusion going. They’re quite happy with it, even though many of the effects of the illusion have been catastrophic, both at the individual and societal levels.

How could it have happened? Easily enough, I’m afraid. Too many of us are sheep in the meadow, content to be herded. We blindly trust what we read in the daily papers or see on the evening news, and save our critical thinking only for those issues that appear to have a direct and immediate personal impact on us. Why question authority? It’s easier to let others decide what’s best for us. If a sports medicine physician proclaims that anabolics are deadly and dangerous drugs, we believe it without reservation. If a politician or government spokesman says our steroid laws are working, who are we to challenge it? Negative and alarming reports are all we’ve heard from the mainstream media; the flow of information to the public has been carefully controlled to ensure that. Inextricably binding steroids to cheating athletes has well served the agenda of some powerful special interests. Demonizing steroids has been great for the media. While alternative views exist, they have gone unheralded. Suppression and punishment seem totally natural public responses to the non-medical use of these substances. Freedom is never mentioned as having anything to do with it.

Freedom has everything to do with it. The more we submit to additional layers of governmental protection from ourselves, the more freedom we sacrifice. Where will it end? Prepare for further losses of freedom. The same players who brought us the Anabolic Steroid Control Act are at it again: this time to dupe us into believing that broadly depriving everyone of various over-the-counter health food supplements is in our best interests. Yet another freedom will be lost. Who knows what it will be next time?

British author George Orwell wrote the words, “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four” – even though you’re being told otherwise. It’s the freedom to give voice to the real truth, untainted by disinformation and propaganda. Is that freedom of value to you? You have a choice. You can continue to believe what you’ve been told without thinking much. Or you can open your eyes to examine the facts and discover the truth for yourself. My aim is to help you to do that.

This book is limited to the topic of anabolic steroids. Together, we’ll explore all the legal and ethical territory associated with their use. You will probably be shocked and perhaps appalled by what you will read. You may feel a sense of outrage. If, at the end of our journey, you conclude that you had previously been manipulated and deceived about this subject, you may well find yourself asking what other “truths” may be illusory. How accurate and objective is the other information that’s been fed to us on issues of health and science policy? Or even, frighteningly, on issues of the economy, history, or national and world affairs? Take courage. There are many uncharted roads ahead, much to be explored, and a flock in the meadow in need of brave shepherds.

Rick Collins
October, 2002