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                WATCH OUT, GUYS, ALL MEN ARE NOW ILLEGAL

             by Dave Barry, Pulitzer Prize winning columnist

           copied from The Boston Sunday Globe, June 23, 1991


        Ask yourself this question:  Are you a guy of the male gender?
    If so, I advise you to report to prison immediately, because you
    are violating a federal law.

        I base this statement on a letter I got from alert reader
    Richard Watkins, M.D., who sent me a shocking medical document
    concerning the federal Anabolic Steroids Control Act.  Steroids,
    as you know, are substances that some guys put in their bodies in
    an effort to develop bulging, rippling, sharply defined muscles
    like the ones Michael Keaton wore in "Batman."  This is foolish,
    because women are not attracted to rippling, sharply defined
    muscles.  Women prefer a type of male physique that is known, in
    body-building circles, as: "the newspaper columnist."  This is a
    softer, more-rounded, aerodynamic shape, similar to the one used
    in the popular Ford Taurus station wagon.  This physique has
    inspired a whole line of mature-guy casual pants, which go by the
    name "Dockers" because it was not considered a shrewd marketing
    move to come right out and call them "Pants For The Bigger-Butted
    Man."

        But back to steroids:  They have bad side effects, although it
    took medical researchers many years to discover this.  They'd get
    a bunch of steroid users together and say, "OK, anybody having bad
    side effects, raise your hand!"  The steroid users would strain
    and grunt like water buffaloes in labor, but due to their extreme
    muscularity they couldn't raise their hands above their waists.
    Many of them must press elevator buttons with their foreheads

        The result was that medical researchers had no idea what kinds
    of problems steroids were causing until one day when they happened
    to ask for oral responses.  Then they discovered the awful truth:
    Steroids can cause men to develop *thick Austrian accents.*  This
    is what happened to Arnold Schwarzenegger, who was actually born
    and raised in Topeka, Kan., and spoke like a regular American
    until he used steroids to build his body up to the point where he
    was legally classified by the US Census Bureau as "construction
    equipment."

        Today, of course, Arnold is a steroid-free person with a
    successful career as a versatile film actor who has played a
    variety of roles, ranging from a large man with a thick Austrian
    accent who throws bad guys off apartment roofs, to a large man
    with a thick Austrian accent who throws bad guys off *hotel
    roofs.*  He's also an active Republican and was recently appointed
    chairman of the President's Council on Physical Fitness in a
    moving Rose Garden ceremony that culminated in Arnold trowing Sen.
    Edward Kennedy off the White House roof.

        So anyway, the government is cracking down on steroids.  I
    thought this was a fine idea until I got Dr. Watkins' letter,
    which is written on a hospital physical-examination form, in the
    section headed "Chief Compaaint and Present Illness."

        "Here I am," Dr. Watkins writes, "sitting around in my doctor
    suit waiting for an emergency to happen, and suddenly I get a
    memo:  *On Feb. 27, 1991, testosterone was declared a controlled
    substance, like heroin."*

        My immediate reaction was to think that Dr. Watkins had been
    wearing his stethoscope way too tight.  But it turns out he's
    telling the absolute truth.  With his letter, he enclosed a
    document from the Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound, listing
    various types of anabolic steroids now controlled by the federal
    government, and *testosterone* is on the list.  I swear I am not
    making this up.

        This is a big problem, because *many* guys, including several
    known Supreme Court members, are walking around with testosterone
    in their, um, possession.

        They can't help it.  As Dr. Watkins put it, in medical term-
    inology, testosternone is "a substance exuded by your you-know organs,
    herein-after your Ralphs."

        In small quantities, testosterone produces only mild side
    effects, such as the inablility to stop pressing the channel-chang-
    ing button on the TV remote control. But at higher levels, testos-
    terone causes destructive male behavior, the two most terrible kinds
    being:
     1. War
     2. Do-it-yourself projects.

        It's a well-known fact that a male with even a moderate testos-
    terone level would rather drill a hole in his hand (which he prob-
    ably will) than admit, especially to his spouse, that he cannot do
    something himself.  Put an ordinary male on the Space Shuttle, and
    within minutes he'll be telling his spouse that by God he'll repair
    the retro thruster modules, because if you call in NASA they'll just
    charge you an arm and a leg.  I personally have destroyed numerous
    perfectly good rooms by undertaking frenzied testosterone-induced
    efforts to fix them up despite the fact that I have the manual dex-
    terity of an oyster.  Hundreds of years from now, archeologists
    will look at my home-improvement projects and say, "This civiliza-
    tion was apparently wiped out by a terrible natural disaster in-
    volving spackle."

        So we see that the criminalization of testosterone is a good
    thing.  I'm not sure how the authorities will enforce this law,
    but I imagine  they'll start by arresting those with obviously
    excessive testosterone levels, such as Warren Beatty, the National
    Hockey Leaugue, Bluto and Phyllis Schlafly.

        Eventually all of us guys will be arrested and placed in a
    rehabilitation program (motto: "Just Say No To Ralph") and they
    won't let us out until we pass a strict test wherein we have to
    hold a TV remote control in our hands and watch one show for
    *three consecutive minutes.*