Do you know of an activity that currently enjoys greater praise than physical exercise and health care? Companies and organizations encourage their workers to practice sports. Private television networks promote campaigns where they associate, and not without reason, sport and well-being. In the higher education curriculum, the Degree in Physical Activity and Sports Sciences is very popular. There is even a wide range of routines to do outside and inside the home. It on-line It opened new possibilities to start practicing sports or to make training more accessible. But can sport in turn be a risk to the individual’s own health?
An active lifestyle provides the body with powerful life support. Many studies indicate that Physical exercise, beyond reducing diabetes, hypertension, bone problems and strokes, improves cognitive function and also contributes to preventing and improving anxiety, stress and depression problems..
In our culture, sport is also associated with leisure, socialization and moral education. That curricular subject that many continue to call “Gymnastics” can hardly be separated, as Gilles Lipovetsky pointed out in twilight of duty, of a must-be. Underlying the moral values of sport is the control of will, the desire to improve, the sense of effort, pride in the body, loyalty and solidarity. Although many of these values persist today, it is important to highlight that the social representations linked to sport have evolved over time.
Underlying the moral values of sport is the control of will, the desire to improve, the sense of effort, pride in the body, loyalty and solidarity.
The sporting spectacle has lost its influence as a social pedagogy and as a mere popular entertainment. Sport today captivates through the communication strategies of the brands, the extreme and unprecedented achievement and the Show narcissist who displays himself daily on Instagram. The transformation of social representations linked to sport does not obviously exclude the emergence of a new ethic. The aesthetic perfection of bodies and behaviors emerges, with some exceptions, in sports practice.. For mass culture, sport is a social duty to which today we must dedicate ourselves body and soul.
A recent example of this new trend can be found in the criticism that former tennis player Garbiñe Muguruza has suffered, whose physique has changed after her retirement. A good part of social media users have focused on her weight gain and not on whether she maintains good habits. Let’s be honest: it’s absolutely normal to gain weight when you stop following an extremely hard training plan. Now, as she herself admitted, just because she no longer has the physique of an Olympic athlete does not mean that it is not important to “stay healthy and fit and enjoy life.” The question is, Did the extreme demands of sports practice previously prevent you from being happy and enjoying things? When this happens, can we still talk about a person being healthy? How does this requirement influence the mental health of women and men?
It is no longer enough to train, you have to show it. Some athletes, whether amateur or professional, justify this with the desire to inspire others and get them “hooked” on the sport. Other people simply expose it as part of their lifestyle or because it is part of their job, as in the case of coaches, physios or sports instructors. There are also those who, without much reflection, dedicate themselves only to imitating their influencers favorites: aren’t fashions there to follow? I do not appeal here exclusively to young people but to many adults who revere influencers of very disparate cuts, from that super mommy and runner that is Verdeliss, to the models Malena Costa and Vanessa Lorenzo, or arriving, ultimately, to zumbas like the controversial Llados. A scan of their publications may be enough to reach the following conclusion: in the exhibition what rewards is not so much the search and maintenance of health as obtaining a certain income or social capital.
“It’s no longer enough to train, you have to show it”
Obviously, reproducing the behaviors of others is not without risks. For example, the trends that support fitness model They can cause injuries without a personalized training plan. Additionally, their advice and training programs may not be effective for everyone. The will is the center of his messages and those who do not achieve it seem to not be trying too hard, that they do not have enough initiative or motivation, that they are a weak and inferior being. The discursive legacy of the most savage capitalism finds its perfect victims here.
The story is cruel, harmful and misleading because it often ignores other factors that can influence sports practice and its results: metabolic or hormonal problems, illnesses, family burdens that prevent having free time or a good rest to be able to « “give everything” in the gym, financial problems that can be a barrier to hiring personalized training or accessing healthier foods.
Isn’t it curious (or suspicious) that while the demand for work productivity is questioned, the unconditional duty to “crunch the body” is imposed? The more rights and possibilities there are to dispose of oneself in the private sphere, the more availability, commitment and effort sports activity requires? What if sport was no longer about being healthy and fit but about subscribing to a new alienation? How many economic benefits do activities that feed on people’s frustrations and bodily insecurities generate? And about his failures? Behind a chronology of images that show the physical change of a person, how many are there that show us that there were many others who did not make it?
Some habits, which are seemingly harmless, can become behavioral addictions and share characteristics with substance addictions. When physical exercise becomes the main motivation in people’s lives, interfering in other areas of development and neglecting comprehensive well-being, we can hardly continue talking about sports practice being functional and therefore positive.
Some habits, which are seemingly harmless, can become behavioral addictions and share characteristics with substance addictions.
Currently, addiction or dependence on physical exercise does not specifically appear in the main diagnostic manuals such as the DSM-V-TR or the ICD-10. However, In the scientific literature, there are a variety of references to the pathological use of physical exercise.. The most common terms are “abusive”, “obsessive”, “compulsive”, “excessive”, “addictive” and “compulsive”, and are often accompanied by case studies. Some instruments have also been developed to identify and measure the pathological use of sport, such as the Exercise Addiction Inventory (EAI) or the SAS-15 Scale (Sport Addiction Scale-15).
To talk about abusive behavior and dependency in sport, it is important assess the intensity, the amount of time invested or the degree of interference in the individual’s social, family and work relationships. Those who show a behavior of obsession and dependence on sport experience a strong desire to practice exercise, their behavior being excessive to maintain physical fitness, carrying out training tailored to their needs or the requirements of a specific competition.
So, what differentiates the functional behavior associated with sport from the pathological is that in the latter the person has lost control, experiences strong physiological and psychological symptoms of withdrawal when deprived of it and, despite suffering negative consequences, continues to maintain this behavior. In the current context, where the link between health and sport predominates – and as we said before, not without reason – many cases where physical exercise is problematic and pathological can be normalized, dissimilated and minimized. The cult of duty over the body, which claims to privilege health, combat laziness and reinforce self-control, may no longer seek to create stronger bodies and souls but rather more dependent, insecure and narcissistic lives.