Is Gambling Destructive to Society?

Great Debates
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::Scott pulls up a lawn chair::

Oh, wait, I just remembered. I can’t/shouldn’t lawn chair a thread. I will have to actually comment.

All right then. Rick, Elvis is in no way lying. You have stated what you meant your statements to mean. However, that does not mean that Elvis will nor read what you read, and interpret a different way then how you intended it to mean. Perhaps he was even right to have done so. After all, sometimes people reveal views in their speech, and can’t believe it when people point out they have no leg to stand on via the view they didn’t even realize they were expressing.

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I wonder if the question shouldn’t be phrased differently.

I liked the comparison between gambling and alcohol in the OP. As an avid malt whisky and wine (and sometimes beer) lover, I wouldn’t say alcohol is destructive to society. Rather, I’d say alcoholism is destructive. (I’d also say, to some people; not to society.)

Likewise, it seems to me that addiction to gambling is what would be destructive to society.

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True, but there’s a sharp distinction between several of the forms of gambling you mentioned and ‘casino’ gambling: Your informal Super Bowl pools and bingo game and whatnot are entirely self-contained, where the same amount of money the players brings goes home with them, and there’s a maximum limit to how much money you can burn at the things, because there’s no ‘house’ willing or able to field you when you slap your mortgage on the table.

As far as I can tell, the question of backroom poker games is on an entirely different class from casino gambling; presuming you’re gaming among friends, you can’t possibly wreck your life doing it. This makes it about as financially safe as spending your cash on some other form of entertainment. Frankly, I don’t intend to argue that that sort of gambling is a social ill at all.

‘Formalized’ gambling, on the other hand, has more going against it. It is nothing more than a forum specifically designed to take advantage of people’s weaknesses with regard to risk, and the more weakness a person has in this regard, the better they like it. Becuase there’s no built-in protections on the amount spent gambling (such as the usual protection of only being able to spend so much money on Madame Tussard’s in an evening before you run out of evening) it becomes true that formalized gambling targets the weaknesses of people in such a way that allows (or encourages) them to spend far more than they can afford. The fact that you, and many other people, have more than enough restraint not to gamble away all your funds does not change the fact that there are people who lack that restraint and spend money they can’t afford to lose, and that those people would not be doing so if formalized gambling did not offer such a convenient and easy mechanism to do so.

When assessing wether something is a ‘social ill’, I figure you have to take into account both its pros and cons, and ‘weigh’ the two. This weighing is, of course, going to be subjective. Formalized gambling has benefits; a lot of people find it entertaining and a few people get a lot of money from it. Also, a few people lose their shirts. As one who thinks that a million one people’s fun evenings don’t pay for one person’s life collapsing into a shambles, I think that the overall harm done by the formalized gambling industry outweighs the admitted benefts that it has.

Now, maybe if I gambled myself, I’d have some selfish inclination to say that yeah, because I’m enjoying it, it doesn’t matter that some people get plowed down in the wake of the industry. I’m pretty darned selfish, after all. Unfortunately I don’t partake, so I’m left insufficiently impressed by the benefits of other people being entertained to overlook the, perhaps small, amount of harm it does to a perhaps small number of people.

As previously stated, YMMV.

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Here’s the problem. When I was 27, my life collapsed into a shambles, and gambling had nothing to do with it. The proximate cause was a hurricane; primary causes were an emotionally abusive father and an even more abusive high school experience which left me with untreated severe clinical depression and pretty much negative self-esteem. Also, I’ll remind you that my boyfriend’s buddy managed to go pretty heavily into debt without, literally, getting within a thousand miles of a casino or any other form of legal gambling. His life, too became a shambles, one worse than mine, but that was for reasons unrelated to gambling, but completely related to stupidity. I’d tell you why, but I don’t quite believe it myself and I know him. Suffice it to say it involved a trunk full of grenades and federal prison time.

Self-limiting? I don’t buy it. I’ve worked with people who play the state run Daily Number every day. As I said, it pays 500-1 on a 1,000-1 bet. On a daily basis, it’s as sure a money loser as there is. I’ve seen people buy 10 squares on the football pool at work to ensure a win, but the best they’ll do is break even. I know why they’re doing it, or at least one reason. A lot of these people have been ordinary, blue collar guys. The only way they can see striking it rich is buy winning the lottery and, when I’ve bought a ticket for the local lottery which runs into millions of dollars, I’ve known full well I’m buying a dollar’s worth of dreams. To fantasize about quitting a job you hate, travel, have nice things, or simply not worry about how you’re going to pay the bills is well worth a dollar or even five to me and I’m sure that’s true of the guys I see doing that.

As I said in my first post, I’ve played backgammon with my uncle for British pounds and with the gentleman I’m seeing for Ghirardelli chocolate. begbert, is there a moral difference in these actions to you? I don’t think I’ve ever risked more than $20 USD at a time gambling, and that number’s high. The one time I went to Casino Niagara, I didn’t have enough money to spare on me to try blackjack, so I threw a bit of money into a one-armed bandit, expecting to take a loss. Instead, I won more than I’d spent and walked away with a big grin on my face and yes, a certain amount of pride.

The distinction you’re drawing is, to me, an artificial one. I love the theater and music. There’s nothing stopping me from running up credit card debts buying tickets to plays and concerts except my own conscience telling me I can’t afford it. People are appalled by how easy it is to run up debt buying cars or clothes or meals in restaurants. I could, if I chose, go into debt by going to a knitting shop and buying cashmere and mohair wool to make into things to give to friends or charity. The only limit would be my credit limit, and believe me, I’ve worked with mohair – it’s wonderful stuff to work with, but very expensive. If the quantity of mohair wool I can buy is limited only by my credit limit and the knitting store owner is encouraging me to buy the expensive stuff (they do you know; I know of one who looks down on me because I don’t buy the expensive stuff), is knitting, then, a social ill?

We know for a fact that people become alcoholics and that they drive drunk and kill or injure people. A couple of years ago, I saw that myself when the man two cars ahead of me, high on alcohol, valium, and cocaine, crossed the center line and plowed into a minivan carrying a family of 5 to an evening out. I was subpoenaed to testify at his hearing. My state’s got strict laws about the sale of alcohol, although ironically, those laws make it illegal to buy just one bottle of beer. America tried outlawing alcohol once; the results were worse.

People who are stone sober drive irresponsibly and endanger people, yet we don’t hear driving called a social ill.

I’m a hybrid. Even though I was raised here in the US, I was born in England and I’ve got some rather European attitudes. The British, at least, are far less uptight about gambling, and yet, I don’t think British society compares adversely to American. It’d be interesting to see which country has a higher rate of people who are addicted to gambling.

Come to think of it, wasn’t there a time when educating women was considered a social ill? I think it was something about their ovaries drying up and education rendering them unfit wives and mothers.

CJ

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Something occurred to me after my last post. To me, “gambling” is much broader than merely betting money on some form of game. Here are some examples. Many years ago, I was a college graduate with a degree in Japanese and a job at McDonald’s. My parents had gone to Hawaii for their 25th wedding anniversary and brought back a newspaper full of jobs for people who spoke Japanese. To me, sending a resume off for one of those jobs was definitely a form of gambling. I was risking the cost of a stamp, resume, and cover letter against what seemed like the highly unlikely prospect of a job. If you’d asked me what the odds were, I would have told you they were at least 1000-1. I don’t know what the odds actually were. I do know that long shot paid off and I was hired.

Five years ago, a couple of new friends talked me into going to the local Mensa Regional Gathering (RG for short). I didn’t expect to enjoy myself, but I figured I could afford to risk a few hours against the possibility of meeting some interesting new people. I didn’t expect that gamble to pay off either, but, instead of staying a few hours, I stayed for the duration of the RG, taking a hotel room so I wouldn’t have to drive 30 miles back home, and generally having a blast.

Eighteen months ago, I took a chance and gave my phone number to a gentleman who’d seen me at the local RG several months earlier. There was no monetary risk involved at all, but there was a great deal of humiliation and embarassment at risk, especially since I’d seen him at local events I thoroughly enjoyed and I’d be seeing him at them if I was making a fool of myself by giving him my phone number. He, in turn gambled that I was genuinely interested in him, unlike the last lady he’d been assured was interested in him, and that I would be willing to go out with him. I was, and, eighteen months later, I still enjoy going out with him and spending time with him.

Tomorrow, I’m planning on going to a county fair with my mother. I suffered a knee injury at the beginning of the summer, and I’m gambling that we’ll both derive a reasonable amount of pleasure before my knee becomes too difficult to walk on if that happens. The silly thing’s playing up tonight, so right now, I’d say that’s about a 50-50 bet, but the risk is still worth it to me. On the other hand, if the ground is muddy or slippery and the odds of me falling and injuring my knee become too great, the trip will be off. Mum and I enjoy each other’s company and it’s her birthday on Sunday, but we’d prefer I not reinjure my knee just as it’s finally healing and we’ll keep the risk of that within reason.

If it comes to that, simply by driving out to Mum’s house tomorrow, I’m gambling that the other drivers on the road and I will drive in a reasonably safe fashion. I’m also gambling that a deer won’t choose just the wrong moment to jump out in front of my car, although that has happened to me once before. Deer are an acceptable hazard of driving around here.

To me, all life is a gamble and people judge risks every day, knowingly or not. Money also isn’t the most important thing in my life or the thing I can least afford to lose. I’ve been nearly catatonic from clinical depression; I’ve also been alone and friendship. For that matter, I’ve had the odd health problem this year. My sanity, my friends, and my physical health are things which I would regret losing far more than mere money. Still, I’ve risked my sanity at times; I’ve been downright cavalier about risking my physical health, although that is changing. I even would and have risked losing my friends when I’ve believed enough in what I was doing. Each time, the potential payoff outweighed the potential risk. Gambling with money is only the beginning.

Does this make sense?
CJ

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I did a search for a thread about this topic since I live in a state that in the past couple of years has went from no casinos to slot parlors to full-on table games in order to deal with a budget crunch.

I am one of several thousand of people who will probably be getting a decent-paying job out of it. A position such as a poker dealer should net a person who has no education $40k a year give or take plus solid health and retirement benefits which is far better than most people with little education generally make.

An industry that is a problem for a small percentage of society is not on the face a societal ill, especially when you can factor in the positives - job creation, tax relief.

One must also look at how things go without the casinos: Alcohol is considered by many to be a societal ill however the period where it was prohibited was so tumultuous and had so many resultant problems, it was eventually repealed. It’s another thread but obviously many people thought that if alcohol was an evil, it was a lesser evil than a society that wanted alcohol but could not get it.

Gambling for the majority of people is a diversion. People budget their money for entertainment - some people go to a movie and shoot some pool and others play blackjack or hit the slots or play the ponies. I, myself, have used an allotment of my entertainment budget on movies and billiards and interestingly enough, I never came back from such an evening with more money than I started…

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John_Stamos’_Left_Ear, since this thread is almost five years old, I’m going to ask you to start a new one if you want to discuss this topic and link back to this one. Some of the posters from this thread are no longer active and a new thread will get some new responses.