Ask Lemmy

I'll play the lottery as far in advance of a drawing as I can. You pay $10 to see a movie, it lasts 2 hours. I play $10 and dream for days what I'd do if I won. I have no expectations of winning though.

Other gambling? Nope. Very dumb, waste of money

Gambling destroys lives. Making gambling illegal may be controversial, but I can't see any reason to allow gambling ads.

If you want to gamble, then it's your own life to ruin. If you advertise gambling, then you are ruining other people's lives.

Ban gambling ads.

I discussed this recently with a friend. Commercial gambling, e.g. slot machines, online poker, F2P mobile games, sports betting, etc. seems like exploitation of weak people. These products are carefully optimized for return of investment, which always means nudging people to play more, even if it's bad for them. This book is pretty good: Addiction by Design - Machine Gambling in Las Vegas

It's all a scam as the house and all the intermediaries win, the client over time always loses, and somehow we keep doing it in the name of "fun"

I personally don’t do it, aside from small stakes poker.

Just remember that it doesn't matter if you have an addiction or not, the reason gambling establishments are as affordable or attractive as they are is because there are people feeding their entire life savings/retirement into them right now destroying their lives. They can afford for you to get that fun occasional win as long as the addicted keep them propped up.

If it's casual between friends, you do you so long as it's consentual between all involved parties.

If it's at a real and/or digital casino using real money, I draw the line. Don't really support them personally.

If it's something like an old PC casino game I played growing up where there's typically no real loss besides your time, I'm okay with it. Same applies to games like Balatro or Clover Pit.

Advertising it? Haell nah!

Those online betting sites like the US ones where people have been using insider trading and tampering with sensitive equipment to win bets? Ban the hell out of them!

Sports betting? If it's consentual between a few friends/coworkers, you do you. Otherwise, I wouldn't support it because you don't know whether or not any sore loser will do their best to harass you or worse.

As for legality, I am not a prune about it. Especially since my fursona loves the whole concept of random dice and card luck and at least the card and dice games ( when confirmed not to be rigged ) are mainly pure luck.

Hope to win, expect to lose.

I don't think it should be illegal either, but there should defiantly be limits and protections in place so people don't piss away their life savings over a slot machine.

Often people in difficult finical situations are the most addicted to gambling or playing the lotto because they are manipulated with hopes of a life changing big payout.

One simple idea to help, have a seperate bank account. You get a special "gamble debit card" that you can deposit up to 5% of your earnings from the previous year. Any kind of gambling can only accept this card - including food/drink at the facility. Winnings can be cashed out or used to refill the card.

Even if this isn't a regulated thing, people can do this on their own - leave all the main cards at home and make sure you can't transfer money to your debit without physically going to a bank.

I don't have strong feelings about it either way. No real appeal for me

I play micro stakes poker. Without gambling its likely that I wouldn't. Its something I enjoying doing, am able to afford, and entertains me for less than the cost of going to the cinema for, potentially, a longer amount of time. So I suppose I view it as entertainment.

I take part in regular live low stake tournaments, which are more of a social get together than anything really competitive.

I'll occasionally put a little on horses.

I think issues appears when there no bankroll. I allocate a set amount a month, if I spend it then that's it. If not then whatever is in the account rolls through. Been lucky enough that I dont have to top it up often.

I dont think it should be illegal, I do think there should be more done about awareness, approaches, and pitfalls. I also think there are personality types which are more prone to issues and that could be identified and addressed by looking at deposit and betting patterns, but the industry doesn't due to wanting to make money.

I hate it.

I think gambling has tainted sports and is the epitome of corruption to the core. It's very ironic that a baseball player by the name of Pete Rose, got a lifetime MLB ban for gambling, yet give it 20 some odd years later and Draft Kings is promoted which is gambling.

It fuels addiction, it makes people throw away anything they could that they could bet with, on the off chance, which is narrow, of winning it big.

It's why I hate Las Vegas entirely, I hated it when poker games were nationally broadcast for a while at one point and so on.

Sports gambling is based casino gambling is slop.

I don't do it because it feels like I'm throwing my money away.

John Ralston Saul's The Doubter's Companion - The Dictionary Of Aggressive Common Sense sums it up pretty well:

GAMBLING, STATE - RUN When governments raise money by acting as croupiers, the systems they manage are degenerate and are closer to their end than to their beginning.

The Burmese, for example, could always tell when a dynasty was close to falling; it would set up a state lottery. Early in the 1970s, Western governments turned to licensed gambling to provide the funds which TAXATION no longer seemed able to raise. This initiative has been blamed on many specifics: the financial crisis, tax reform which drastically reduced the contribution of the large corporations, the cost of social programs. The combined result was a lack of money which turned into DEBT and that debt into chronic restraint.

From the moment a government encourages its citizenry to finance the state by gambling — which means by idle dreaming — instead of through creativity, work and productivity, that state is in an unacknowledged crisis.

The only nation to have prospered via gambling is Monaco, which is not a nation. It is a corporation specializing in tax avoidance presided over by a croupier prince.

Personally, I think it's a mug's game.

Gambling as an industry should not exist. It's just predatory.

My friends and I occasionally have poker nights, and its a lot of fun. Its funny how stakes of $5 or $20 - just a few dollars or cents at most for most hands - make a game much more exciting.

The problem is the casinos and sports betting apps...

I'm not much of a gambler. But I was addicted to a few substances many, many years ago, so I know how hard it can be to get out of an addiction and I don't agree with the "that's a relatively low amount (people) can afford to lose": addiction is a bitch, no matter how high or low, end of the debate as far as I'm concerned as an ex-addict. But I also do believe adults should be considered, well, like adults responsible beings... responsible for how smartly or stupidly they want to spend or waste their one and only life on this planet.

Like all things, fine in moderation. Nothing wrong with friendly wagers among friends or spending some money playing casino games. The gambling industry doesn’t exist off the back of these players though and that’s the problem with it

Like most things in life, in moderation it can be fun. Adding some stakes to an activity can make it more exciting.

It becomes a problem when people don't have the self-control to self-regulate, and when it's designed to prey upon those people specifically, or to prey on desperate people who feel like it's the only chance they have to get ahead, or who don't have a good understanding of the risks or chances of winning.

Humans as a whole are bad at understanding probability, and our brains are wired such that the happy chemicals we get from winning are more impactful than the unhappy chemicals we get from losing. As such, someone can be losing money overall, but still feel like they're winning, or at least, still get the rush from winning even though they're way down overall. That's dangerous, and gambling companies are designed to specifically target those people and exploit those destructive behaviors. It's like the experiment with the rat that was given a button to give itself happy drugs, and it just sat there pressing the button constantly. Basically, the regulations are necessary because of capitalism, and because without them, those people would very quickly ruin their lives given the chance while the companies running the operation give zero fucks about it.

Then there's the fraud. Look at prediction markets. They're rife with fraud and bet fixing and it's not only politicians and policymakers doing it. John Oliver had a piece on this recently where he goes into some detail, but there've also been articles about journalists getting harassed and threatened because they report on something that would cause a Polymarket loss.

In conclusion, some humans are shitty and we need regulations to keep shitty people from doing shitty things.

I can't necessarily find justification to ban it but it should come with warning labels and not be glamorized and advertised everywhere like it is. Casinos hurt communities. Gambling in general does. It just sucks money out of the lower classes. Lots of inheritances have been pissed away, lots of college funds too. It's not a net positive, and that gives society a voice in regulating the shit out of it. Now that the internet is here IDK what they can really do anyway though, at least before there was a trip to the casino required to lose a bunch of money.

You're technically always losing because it's in embedded in the programs and the host/casino/whatever cannot lose money. You have to be an idiot to be gambling.

It's like alcohol. Kids should not use it. Most adults are able to use it in moderation and are fine. It's stupid but they are free to spend their money however they like. Some people can't handle it.

It should be regulated by limiting access to it, limiting advertising and protecting people that can't handle it.

I have no interest in gambling. I like watching sports, but I think gambling on it would ruin it for me since the outcome of the game would have a material effect on me.

I don't enjoy it. I think it's sad when people get addicted to it.

I don't even like big random factors in games. One of the things I like about the dark souls franchise is there's very little randomness. You never win or lose because "lol critical hit", like you might in something closer to D&D

Im a victimless crime guy (I use the term loosely and am aware for anyone seeing the term that you can say the user is a victim or knock on effects) so like all this stuff being legal and have felt that way forever. I do want it highly regulated to minimize harm and I think it should be taxed higher than less harmful things. One thing I did not realize until legalization occured that advertising is really problematic with all these type of "adult" activities. So now I am a bit modified in my stance that I don't think advertising should be allowed outside of the establishments themselves. So no roadside signs about a casino at the next exit and such. To see cigarette, alcohol, drug, prostitution, gambling ads you should have to be in one of those establishments to begin with which should not allow minors. So like kids should not be allowed in liquor stores or bars even with a parent. Things like casinos can have hotels where kids are allowed but no advertising for it there. It should be treated as a seperate business that just so happens to have a path to the casino.

Alex Trebek put it this way. "If I win $100.00 I don't feel that wonderful, but if I lose $100.00 I'm very angry."

My sentiments.

I worked in a casino in the late 90's. I dealt with supplying the coins and payouts for all the slot machines. When a machine would have a jackpot I could have the payout and paperwork printed and waiting before the techs could get to the machine. Everything would show up on my computer screen, including when there was a machine fill done.

Now ask yourself what prevents the machines from being "tighter" or "looser" at the push of a button or click of a mouse.

Every single game is designed to make the house a profit. The only way to truly win at gambling is to own the casino or not play.

Absolutely should be illegal. People will do it anyway, but there will necessarily be restraints on the way it fucks up peoples' lives. Same as underage drinking.

Last time I gambled I won $90. Figured that was the best it was ever going to get, and gave it after that. Go out on a high note, right?

Now that I'm thinking about it, I mainly have a gripe with people getting addicted to gambling. Can be in many different forms IMO; can be spending too much money at the Blackjack table (which is somewhat skill-dependent), whaling on lootboxes/gachas (where you'd literally never "win" money back), or even day trading (which is technically positive-sum)

In theory everything is fine in moderation, but then most gambling systems reward people to whale whether they intend it or not, so...