Please note:
I need facts about the negative impacts of gambling. If you are pro-gambling, hey great, but please start your own thread if you would like to discuss or debate that. Thank you!
The situation:
In three or four months my city will have a vote on whether to allow river boat gambling in our city. I am personally against this and I am trying to obtain all the information I possibly can in order to fight this.
My questions:
-Do you have knowledge of any studies on the negative impacts of gambling on a community? Or would you know where I should look for information of this type?
-Do you have personal experience of a similar situation? Do you know what did or did not work to combat the pro-gambling forces?
-If you have any other thoughts or ideas on where to obtain this information or how to organize against this I am open to hearing them.
HA! Excellent. I am not against gambling, I choose not to. But I have become a NIMBY regarding gambling. I am not sure if that makes me a hypocrite or not, but that is probably a subject for another thread.
Good luck with your fight, but don’t hold your breath, those guys have mega-bucks ready to spend on getting it legalized and personally I agree with it. We have had too many personal freedoms stripped away already. Check here though for a view of both sides (pdf):
Why don’t you want it? Do you think sleazy prostitutes and drug-addled molesters will follow? Gambling has been a good thing in Illinois. There are problem gamblers everywhere. And they’re doing it whether the state sanctions it or not. I’m just curious on why you don’t want it in your back yard.
Here in Des Moines, since the introduction of “Prairie Meadows” a horse track/slot machine casino, the opposite is true. The number of pawn shops have risen about 600%. Everyone knows someone who blew it all at the casino and is now a blight on the general public. Meth/Crank abuse is out of control, and many attribute these problems directly to the casino.
I’m no left winger. I feel that people have to live with the decisions that they make whether they be gamblers or drug addicts etc. However, I don’t think that the State of Iowa needs to sponsor a “stupid tax” in the form of a casino, lottery, or anything else.
The boats in Joliet, Aurora, and everywhere else in IL, have a huge population from which to draw customers. In Iowa, those large population centers just don’t exist. So any negative impact that the casion produces is more focused, and as such, we all pay the price whether we gamble or not.
In San Jose, CA, there is a downtown card room that is fairly close to a housing subdivision. They took the card room to court to try to restrict the hours of operation due to noise…they lost.
Also, the Indian Gaming Commission in California felt that large corporations posed the threat of an uncontrolled expansion of gambling in California (read: too much competition). The thread is here…
i agree with bongmaster, good luck.Once your state sees how much money it brings in they become addicted. In my state, casino taxes brought in more money than taxes on corporations
You’re in luck, I duked it out on another message board last year when a casino was trying to come into my city (it was defeated).
First of you wanna look at Tunica County, Mississippi, a piss-poor little area that bought the “oh but the casino will make you rich” argument hook line and sinker. Their crime rates skyrocketed, their incomes didn’t improve as much as you’d expect and a whole bunch of other nasty stuff increased.
What you wanna do is emphasize the increase in crime that will almost certainly go up if your city brings in a casino. Can your city afford to hire more cops to chase down the thugs that will be running around? Can your area’s divorce rate stand to shoot up a few points? Bankruptcies, drugs, prostitution, etc? GOD FORBID your city is a college town!!! College kids are really bad to gamble.
Don’t get me started on these casino bastards. Ever notice how they dangle the carrot in front of poor areas only? You’ll never see a casino open in Beverly Hills – 1. nobody’s desperate for money there and 2. rich people know that you don’t get rich off of gambling.
With the links I post, some will be about this particular place and some cover before-and-after effects in other places:
I can also provide anecdotal information regarding how casinos treat their employees … or rather, how this particular casino I know of did/does. If you want to hear it let me know and I’ll email you.
And, you know, the thousands and thousands of people who are employed by the casinos in a myriad of jobs from dealers to security to housekeeping to food service to the people who design and build the gambling machines. Oh, and the millions and millions of people who take a yearly vacation to places like Las Vegas and gamble within their means because they actually enjoy it.
Sorry, Ruok, I know you didn’t want any pro-gambling comments here. Although I do enjoy gaming, I do not believe it should be legal everywhere. But comments like the one above are not a legitimate argument against it. Good luck on your fight.
I’m personally for gambling but I shall respect your request and not debate my side of the argument here. But I fail to understand why you’d ask us to do this.
Don’t you want to learn the possible arguments your opposition will bring up so you can be prepared and intelligently debate the proposal?
Don’t you want to learn all you can about the issue so you can make an informed choice? If you don’t know why you’re against gambling…well then, why are you against gambling?
I am not against gambling as I stated in my response to KC.
Ultimately what it comes down to is my children. I don’t want to raise my children in an area that has the problems that big time gambling typically brings. Am I jumping to a conclusion? Yes, but I am comfortable with the evidence of communities that have allowed it.
Before you ask, I am not against alcohol, or guns, or any other legal item or pastime (for the most part) in moderation. But there is no free lunch, or free money for that matter. As sure as the sun rises in the East there will be lives that will be ruined from gambling at this proposed casino. What is the acceptable level of lives ruined relative to how many tax dollars flow? Here is one time when I can actually make a difference.
‘If it saves just one life then it is worth it.’ How many times have you heard that? This is one time for sure I know that I will be saving someone’s life. I know I will be saving a family from devastation.
I am not on a crusade to destroy gambling. I am on a crusade to protect my little corner of the world. If you feel that is misguided I am comfortable with that. I will do what I think is in the best interest of my children, you can’t convince me otherwise.
While I can completely understand where you are coming from I have to disagree with the “if it saves just one life” notion. I believe this is the core of the personal freedoms issue in this country. In my eyes, and this will sound cruel, it is worth the pain and suffering some will go through in order to ensure that individuals can choose to do what they will with their bodies and their time. Obviously legalizing pot is a big one to me, but I see gambling in the same light. It is a personal freedom that no one should have the right to take away from others because some of the population can’t handle it responsibly. Will people’s lives be ruined? Almost certainly. Is it worth giving people these personal freedoms regardless of that? I believe it is, and I respect that others do not. Its all about how much pain and suffering you feel is acceptable in the name of freedom.
How anyone treats their body or suffers financially is fine if it only affects themselves. As soon as it starts to impact me in any way then it does become my business. Unfortunately the negatives from the casino won’t be in a vacuum but will impact me, my children and my community. To me this is avoidable, undesireable, and certainly not what I envision when I think of ‘freedom’.
Why should my children be subjected to all the negative aspects that will surely come with a casino? Where are THEIR rights? Are you saying that the personal freedom of gambling should outweigh my children’s personal freedom to not suffer from all of the crap that will surely come with a casino? Really?
I am not denying anyone their freedom to gamble. In my city there is the state lottery and all the games that entails. There is an Indian casino, a dog track/slots, a horse track/slots, and plenty of riverboats all within an easy 45-120 min drive. I just don’t think it should be ubiquitous. I don’t think my kids should be subjected to all the negatives. Is that so wrong?
As far as letting people suffer in the name of freedom or trying to make a difference, well, I think I am going to err on the side of trying to make a difference, trying to help others. Opposing the casino is just one teeny-tiny way. I guess my suggestion to anyone who avoids helping others would be to aim higher.
Change the world? No. Try to make my tiny corner of the world better? Yes.
