Sin

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/08/25/opinion/bad-pleasures-virtues.html

("The Virtues of Being Bad")

OK, you want me to reveal my inner demons. I still root for the Yankees. Ok, I said it. Yes, I understand they are everything that is wrong with America, greed and dominance of lesser beings their very essence. 

I hated those who cheated their way to success in baseball through the use of steroids like Roger Clemens, Alex Rodriguez, Jason Giambi. That is, until they became members of my team. Then I decided everyone else did it so what's wrong with leveling the playing field?

I can forgive them virtually all their trespasses, my moral code becoming most relaxed when looking at the universe at just the right angle. It is kind of like my attitude toward golf. I am taken aback by my friends who seemingly have forgotten how to count past six when adding up their strokes on any particular hole. 

But my radar screen on ethics and honesty seems to evaporate when my errant tee shot is not sitting up just so in the rough. Without a hint of remorse, picking up the Titleist I have just whacked in undesired places, to examine and confirm, to no one in particular, my ownership of this ball (which it kind of, maybe, might not have been, at least until this moment), and then gently improving my lie (no wonder they call it a lie). And don't get me started on all those three footers I have never putted. This game being an endless loop of determined effort on my part to masquerade guilt as absolute innocence. 

I guess you could rightly say that sports brings out the worst in me. Cheating and maneuvering to one's unfair advantage a most horrible sin. 

That is, when committed by others.