Today’s question is motivated by a stunning statistic I read in today’s NJ Shit Ledger —- the gambling industry made a $53 BILLION DOLLAR PROFIT last year, the most ever. Sports gambling increased by 166%. I guess all those endless sportsbook commercials are paying off; about how fun and easy it is to place a bet “in the comfort of your own home“, happy families shown enjoying their winnings (everyone wins!!), get paid the same day(!!), in game parlays (!!!) and if you actually lose a bet (really unlikely!!) they will give you back $1,000!!! What. A. Great. Deal.
Q1: What is YOUR actual experience with gambling?
Q2: How do you feel ABOUT gambling?
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Me?
1)— I had a one week vacation in St. Kitts, an incredibly beautiful island. I would go back in a heartbeat. Anyway, the Marriott had gambling. The last night there I checked my food bill; it was over $700 … that’s what $20 hamburgers will do. So, what the hell … I took out $100 from the ATM, went to the blackjack table ($2 min bets) and I promptly lost that $100 in less than half an hour. Took out another $100 … promising myself I would go no further, although I probably would have. Just one more time, just one more dollar. I swear, dear Jeebus, please let me win!
Fortunately, I didn’t have to go to the ATM a third time. Over the next five or so hours, I won almost $800! And I had a blast at the table. The Lord was blessing me!
My 2nd biggest winning ever was $300 via a football pool that cost $5 to enter … I got something like 18 out of 20 correct picks.
I’ve played the Lottery exactly two times in my entire life … they were something like $400 million+ jackpots both times. I felt pretty good about my chances. I was devastated when I lost. Of course, there were the dime-ante type card games. I never won, or lost, more than $100.
(I did gamble on marrying my first wife. I’m still paying for that bet … mentally, not financially.)
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2)— Anything other than recreational gambling … let’s say, card games under $100 … gambling is a blight on society. A society where a significant percentage of the population is addicted to gambling, is a society that is in decline, a nation whose end is near. If I were a Holy Roller, I would say gambling is an egregious SIN.
Let’s look at it from a philosophical perspective. Gambling, in and of itself, is proven to be devoid of value and worth. To determine the nature of a “thing” we can look at the effect it produces. So, what are the effects of gambling?
—– For starters; poverty, addiction, crime, divorce, strife, and of course, if your addiction is powerful enough so that it rules over your very own mind, it can lead to alcoholism, drugs, and even murder. These are all external manifestations. A life destroyed.
—– Gambling also has terrible effects internally. It can lead to many, or all, of the following; GREED, discontent, materialism, laziness, exploitation, an angry bitter spirit, and loss of faith (as you rely on chance rather than on God’s providence). A mind destroyed.
Some people say humans don’t need God to be moral. But, gambling is one of those things which put a lie to that belief. What can a non-Christian point to which calls out gambling as immoral, even evil? Nothing. Would they suggest government pass a law against gambling? That would be utter nonsense. Passing a law, besides being against libertarian principles, only insures MORE of the thing being regulated. Besides, you can’t legislate morality, they say.
I didn’t need any “laws” to keep me on the straight and narrow, in terms of gambling. All I needed was a little guidance from my parents (who never, ever, gambled), and God, via the book of Proverbs:
“Whoever works his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows worthless pursuits like gambling will have plenty of poverty”
OK, I added the “like gambling” part. But, you get the idea … gambling destroys!
THE END
Q1: I only gamble with my life, never with my money.
Q2: The House always wins.
Casinos aren’t in business to lose money.
Suckers are.
Just go to a casino for the food, can be pretty good and affordable.
Watch the old people at the slots.
After the one armed bandit pull one can see the addicted person sag as the lemons line up, so sad.
I hate losing money FAR more than I like winning it gambling.
Why I don’t gamble.
Now in games of skill, not luck, I relish that.
Like golf or poker.
Sign up for the card. Play their money they give you to sign up. Keep the proceeds, if any. Watch your mailbox. I get $10 monthly dining credit and 5-10/week free slot credit from 3 different casinos in KC. I eat their Reuben sandwich which is quite good and play with their money.
I concur with Mr. Shackleford, with caveats;
Q1: I only gamble with my life, when I perceive I am in control.
When you win, you are god. And you will only lose once.
Q2: I never gamble with money or jeopardy.
Money (possessions) are temporal, and their gain or loss is inconsequential as they can be gained or lost again. Therefor, there is no excitement in the mundane.
Jeopardy is a fool’s master. Do not gamble with your defense. Never cede your life to the state.
And for those addicted to gambling, get in line.
The world is full of addictions.
And I respect everybody’s right to destroy themselves.
Your talking to the unvaccinated crowd here.
Having had Covid Classic before the vaccines were rolled out, I knew that my risk from remaining “unvaccinated” was virtually non-existent. I also knew that the risk of dysregulating my immune system by taking a novel, experimental mRNA shot I didn’t need was non-zero, and probably couldn’t be known until years hence.
Not everything is binary.
First time I went gambling was in Blackhawk Co. couldn’t lose, gambled and drank all day . Second time I went gambling was in KC Mo. Lost my ass made it back home with a $1.23 in my pocket, never really got the fever to gamble again
Q1 – Never really gambled much outside of a regular poker game when I were a troubled lad. It was more a social get wasted drunk than a gamble make huge winnings event. Bought the rare lotto ticket, mostly bought them as fun gifts for others like at Christmas time.
Q2 – How I feel about gambling?? I always viewed it as either a fun thing, like going to a farmers market or fairs of some sort, its never controlled me. We’ve been to Vegas a couple times, not to gamble, mainly passing thru and trips to The Gun Store there.
Seeing the results of people addicted to gambling is jarring and a good place to see that on full display is Vegas. Locally you see the same but on a smaller scale. Old folks that spend everything on reams of tickets, spending a couple hundred and ‘winning’ fifty bucks. Only to spend that fifty on more tickets. I’ve actually met people whose retirement plans were to win the lottery so they spend every penny they can on lotteries…
A fool and his money are soon departed…
bottom line… its your money, do with it as you see fit, you rule it or it rules you…
Gambling…a great way to lose money quickly.
At a 7-11 I always seem to get stuck behind some fool (usually black) who can least afford it, buying $100 worth of lottery tickets.
The odds of winning the lottery are about the same as predicting the correct address that will be randomly drawn from all possible addresses in the US.
Good luck with that.
I got enough vices. I don’t need to add one more.
Q1 – The only form of gambling around when I was a kid was the dog and horse race tracks. My father took me to my first track where on dumb luck I won the daily double on my 1st 2 races. It paid me $1200. Very bad luck. Over the next few months, I lost that and much more. My first trip to Vegas was when the Mob still ran things. It was the movie “Casino” in real-time. I ate at Tony Spilotro’s pizza shop. I did fine at 21 for a while but realized before long it was a loser’s bet. I was amazed at how mesmerizing people found the slots. You’d see some fool pumping coins into a machine, see a show, go to bed and come back and the same fool dressed in the same cloths still pumping away. The glitz ran out and I came to despise the city. The one great thing was a club off the strip that featured chorus girls performing totally in the nude (Palomino Club, I think). I REALLY liked that.
Q2-Gambling is a self imposed tax for idiots.
This is what I told my kids on a number of occasions while they were growing up – gambling is a tax on people who don’t understand math.
Who says welfare and working poor don’t pay taxes?
Lottery tickets.
Cigarettes.
Booze.
They probably pay higher tax rates than everyone else combined.
The first time I ever went to Las Vegas during a Red Flag Exercise at Nellis, I sat down at a quarter slot machine at Circus Circus with a roll of quarters and won over $500 within the first few minutes. Worst thing to ever happen to me regarding gambling.
Two weeks later, I’d lost the $500, all of my travel advance from the Air Force and took an advance on the only credit card I had in 1986, a Visa Card offered by the Credit Union with a limit of $500, up to $100 cash advance.
My first husband was livid and made fun of me for going on a five-hundred-dollar TDY to Vegas and coming back with five bucks. I actually laughed at his anger because I had to borrow two dollars from my roommate to pay for my inflight meal heading back to Tinker AFB. Hey! I only lost about $250 total, since I won that $500 jackpot first damn thing and played with CircusCircus money the first few trips downtown, winning a few other smaller jackpots for more than $100, but I was after the BIG payout, at least $100,000!
On days we flew, we went in the evening since the other crew flew the next day. On “crew rest” days, only the die-hard gamblers snuck down to gamble instead of resting for the early morning showtimes. I was hooked on slots, but I wasn’t die-hard until the last night there, when I decided to take out a cash loan from my Visa card and win it all back.
I didn’t.
In recent years, I have visited some of the casinos in Oklahoma a few times and even the casinos here on the Mississippi, but Nick doesn’t like them and he dislikes the atmosphere inside them. I will sit and play slot machines I don’t know how to play just to listen to all the bells and whistles and anticipate a really BIG payoff.
I won $1300 at a nickel-slot machine two years ago and I’ve never been back.
I’m calling myself even with the demon of gambling and have devoted that kind of money wasting to helping my friend Larry a bit and sending flowers to my cousin, Granny Fannie’s favorite, who then shares them with my Mother, with whom I have lunch tomorrow, unless this rain starts freezing again.
In my days of being a ute, I had a job pumping gas at a Hess gas station … about 15 miles from Atlantic City, and right at the entrance to the turnpike to PA. Hardly a day went by, literally, where some schmuck would beg for a couple gallons of gas, “I’ll be back tomorrow to pay you, I swear!!” … often people in fancy schmancy cars. Gas was only 75 cents a gallon so, once in a great while I’d pump 3 or 4 bucks worth, especially if it was a woman, and she was crying. No, they never came back the next day.
Have not bought a lottery ticking in years.
But when I do, feel bad for wasting the money.
And glad I did not win because it would surely ruin my life.
Heaven forbid anyone disagree with Stucky, but I’m feeling feisty today:
Addiction is in the person, not the substance, game, action. Alcoholism is in the alcoholic. Drug addiction is in the drug addict. Gambling addiction is in the addicted gambler.
If it were otherwise, everyone who tried alcohol, drugs, gambling would become addicted.
How do I know this? As a 46+ years sober alcoholic I have some first hand experience and have watched the treatment/psychology people kill more alcoholics by blaming everything/everyone (bottle, parenting, bad breaks, bad marriages/breakups, society, mean tweets, hurt feelings, broken shoelace, etc) except the real problem, which is the alcoholic themselves. Until that is understood, few recover.
We have met the enemy and he is us.
Gambling addiction is a SYMPTON of the person and how they go at life. The person is NOT the victim of gambling, but of their own shortcomings. Casinos just supply a product for the addicted gamblers just like bars serve the alcoholic and drug pushers (legal and illegal) serve the other addictions.
And I couldn’t resist giving a shout out to the hookers and porn sites and the product they supply to the sex addict, just for a last laugh.
I have always called it the addictive personality that some people have. My late BIL was a reformed alcoholic and 40 years sober, but was totally addicted to gambling. I saw him win a $2,000 pot and put the entire thing back into the machines hoping for the “big win”. He always went home with empty pockets.
Switching addictions doesn’t cure the addict. It is a soul issue, hence the “dry drunk.”
GFY
Addiction is a disease like the clot shot is a vaccine.
Addiction is an excuse for personal choice.
Its nicer to label everything disease because it absolves the person from having a guilty conscience from their bad choices…
Like “I was born this way” seeks to absolve one from personal responsibility and their freewill choices.
I never had that much disposable income.
Besides the odd lottery ticket now, never put a nickle into a machine.
However, WV has casinos(!). The local one used to pump MILLIONS into the county/state until Ohio and PA got in on the scam. Not so much anymore.
Our business is right at the exit from Ohio and CONVOYS of tour buses used to roll by the office window into the county from the north. Mostly from the Cleveland/Akron, Erie areas. As well as from Pittsburgh to the East.
Any time I speak with someone from out of state now, I just smile and thank them for their contribution.
The wife and I consider going to the casinos as a fun night out. I play video poker and drink the free bourbon and she plugs the slots. After a few hours, we go to the steakhouse if the casino was good to us or the buffet if we were not winning and then go home. They used to be a lot looser with their freebies, but since ’09 only seem to cater to their high rollers.
I view gambling as entertainment, costing $50 – $60 per evening and on a few occasions taking home more than I took with me. There are, however, those who have an addiction and will put everything they have or can borrow into the machines/tables. I have seen it with family members and it is sad.
1, never been interested in or attracted to gambling. i do think theres a particular kind of personality that finds some interest in it, and whatever it is i dont have it. i have however seen a cousin who obviously does have this bug, basically bankrupt his family and leech off of everyone in the family for endless ‘loans’ because he pisses away every cent he gets his hands on and any credit he’s still good for, gambling. i for the life of me cannot understand why he doesnt quit, but academically know that thats why it’s called an addiction.
(that cousin cant quit smoking, either, and he was first in line for the kill shot, too.. go figure. perhaps the general personality trait is ‘deliberately self destructive’)
2, as the saying goes the house always wins.
Q1 – my only experience with gambling was in college. I had collected a number of pennies over the two semesters and decided to join in a penny-ante game going on in the dorm floor’s lounge.
Note: previous experience with any number of games that involve luck showed my luck quotient was extremely low.
Anyway, I joined the game to get rid of all the unwanted pennies…..and won a bunch more, so I quit.
Q2: Don’t ask me what I feel about this, ask what I think about it. Our society already puts too much emphasis on feeellzz for my taste. I think it’s a bad idea that let’s the fruit inspectors see more of what people are like. It’s also a symptom of a society that has lost its way and is going downhill.
The best food can usually be found at hotel/resorts with casinos. I stay at a couple of these resorts 4 or 5 times a year. Every other trip I will enter the casino, play a slot for 5 to 10 minutes max and leave, never staying more than ten minutes. I have won more than I have lost by shear luck. I don’t recommend gambling in any form as most people don’t have the turn off switch to leave. I never gamble over $40 and only visit the casino once in a 5 day stay at the resort. I’m a lousy gambler.
Some of you may want to argue that the best food could be found in big cities like NYC or Chicago, maybe so, I am speaking of below the Mason-Dixon and I stay out of cities as a general rule.
If the Federal Reserve didn’t exist and didn’t enable the theft of trillions in wealth from our economy, along with an undermining of decent interest rates from banks and the purchasing power of the currency, most people would not see gambling as their only possibility for getting ahead. The gambling cartel is just another government-protected monopoly that only exists legally because the government gets a cut.
I never gamble. It is a suckers game. If you are not greedy and you fear neither life nor death then it is unlikely you will be the victim of any scam, including gambling.
Q #2. Gambling is just another cog in Satan’s gear of addiction. Satan attacks us in all our being–body, soul, and spirit. Prior to the covid travesty Satan’s dominant attack upon mankind for the past several decades has been against the will of men. Our will is part of our soul and therefore gambling is a disease of the soul. As witness of this attack I present the decades long explosion of the full range of addictions–drugs of all kinds, entertainment, porn, with its explosion of pedophilia, video games hijacking two generations of our youth (now adults), sports , gambling, and social media to mention just a few. Addiction is anything which causes us to live without volition or intention. We abdicate our life in hope of something better. Any continuing addiction is a sure sign that we despise our own life and have insufficient gratitude to consider it the gift of God that it is.
I grew up playing cards with my family, and my favorite was always poker. Dealer call it, mostly split the pot stud games and a few oddball games that are a bit complex but great (ie. Spanish Moss if anyone has heard of it). Now, it’s interesting, because we played for nickels and dimes, no one ever won or lost more than 5-10 dollars (still play the same way today). But it had to be something. Playing for free chips was not fun at all.
Just goes to show you, that Gambling is all psychology. Hell, after your basic needs are taken care of, MONEY is all psychology. That is an incredibly deep idea that I’m still wading in, trying to find some sort of bedrock.
Never got much into sports betting, but mostly because I didn’t have any money until a few years ago. By then I had a wife and then a child. SO, I have NEVER had any disposable cash. What I have now all goes to my true addiction: golf.
Took a trip to Vegas in my early twenties with some friends. Mostly I drank, a lot, as was my wont in those days. What gambling I did, I got my ass handed to me, but I could afford my losses. No credit whatsoever. In casinos, the games are not fun (except blackjack at a good table) but they are addictive. The money is big enough to up the dopamine hits of winning to serious addiction levels. Dangerous. The majority of people you see in the casinos are just sad. Addicts wallowing in their addiction. Plus, in my advanced age, I hate loud noises, bright lights and especially crowds.
Bought lottery tickets here and there. 10-20 bucks when the jackpots get extreme. Stupid as fuck, but you always get that what-if. Then you match 1-2 numbers on ALL the cards put together. Sheer idiocy.
That all said, I agree with Grumpy, that addiction is about the addict. As a libertarian, gambling should be legal, with smart regulation when it becomes commercial-scale. As far as a secular way to stop people from gambling…it’s just like drugs. Well put together (psychologically), intelligent people do not need to be told a thing is evil to stay away from it. Gambling is highly addictive, I imagine the dopamine levels are comparable to serious drugs, but not sure of that. These things lead to loss of control of oneself. People need to understand that. Not be told a simple good/evil binary. That was essential in the past, but will not take us into the future. Just my opinion–I think. I may re-evaluate later.
Good question, Stuck.
I’ve always thought that gambling should be legal because (libertarian reasoning). I thought that the government shouldn’t be running it, because it’s unseemingly and immoral to extract money from stupid people. Government should theoretically be trying to help the people, not scam them. Also, it’s a colossal waste of energy – like a business devoted to digging holes and then filling them in. On the other hand, it’s a way to recoup some of the money that the government doles out. So I’m torn. The best tax would probably be aimed at illegals. Maybe a tax on tamales and Modelo.
I like it. We packed up the dogs and headed to the MS Gulf Coast for a few days before New Years. I grabbed 1K in cash as budget for 3 nights and the trip. Room was comped and only think that went on my debit card was fuel. All meals were out of pocket along with my wife getting her Christmas presents and the outlet mall. Hit a pretty good lick on video poker. Got up cashed it out and started over. When we got back on Friday added it all up. Had $950 in cash and had put $150 in the truck for fuel. Net cost of trip $200. That was inclusive of giving the wife $250 at the outlet mall.
Most people don’t understand how to gamble. The more they go in the hole, the more they will spend to try to get out of the hole.
It is because it is not about winning, it is the chance of winning.
It is the bells and whistles and chachingalingalinging into that little metal bucket.
Oh, wait… the coins don’t fall into a bucket anymore, do they? Has it all grown silent? Do they just steal your money without the bells and whistles even?
For me, it was about having a good time on their dime. As I wrote about farther down. Good time as I saw it way back then, anyway.
Believe it or not. Almost every time you go into a casino you get ahead by a certain amount if you know what you are doing. But, the problem is that you are there to relax and spend some time to make the trip worthwhile. When I win I cash out and put it back into real money and use their money, drink their liquor and tip well. If I get down say 500 on a trip I go home. It’s entertainment and that’s it. I walk in a realize that a zero sum game is winning. It’s all about streaks and recognizing that it’s not going your way and move on.
Q1: I went to a dog track once and lost about $20.00. I have spent maybe $25.00 on lottery tickets over the course of a life time.
Q2: Generally I feel gambling is for suckers, though there is nothing wrong with a game among equals who know when to stop and can afford to lose. It burns my ass that governments are involved in it to the extent they are.
Side note: When laptop computers first came out, I did an analysis of dog racing to see if it was possible to consistently make money at it, using advanced statistical techniques and statistical data from racing forms. I had access to the software, and a gambling addict I worked with was coaching me. My conclusion was that I could make as much as I was at my regular work, which was pretty good, but there were some caveats. First, I would have to spend a huge amount of time either at the tracks or doing data entry. Second, I would have to be carrying large amounts of cash (i.e. pockets stuffed) while I was working. Third, there was no real future in it, and it did not seem constructive. I decided not to go further with this.
You spelled GREED wrong. It’s G.R.E.E.D.
I’ve got a friend who just flew out last night to Vegas, I told him to put $50 on black 8 for me.
As for QOTD #1, I am mostly risk-averse except for small stakes card games and football pools. I did win enough to finance a ski trip to Colorado playing Bourre.
As for QOTD #2, I agree with Stucky. While risk-averse, I had an opportunity to invest (gamble) in Sprint in the late ’80s. That $1000 would have made me a fortune. No matter, I haven’t had the destruction of family and fiances many gamblers have. Penny a point for bridge and cribbage, dime, quarter, half dollar, poker was fun and never hurt the enjoyment of playing.
1. I don’t gamble, have never found it entertaining.
2. I agree with the sentiments in #2 above – well put.
An occaisional lottery ticket. In MBA school made a living off NC State when Lou Holtz coached there. He always beat the spread. This was in Tuscaloosa, mid-70s. If you’re from Alabama, you get one guess who my bookie was.
Yes, agreed Stucky, entirely my sentiments. I only gamble on certainties, like the time in the ’80s when I was invited, through business contacts, to meet the owners, trainers and jockeys at Lambourn; which is a working village in Berkshire and is famous for its association with the training of the world’s finest race horses. There are over 1500 horses in training in the Lambourn valley with over 50 Racing Yards.
The local insiders gave me a tip or two and I took it with both hands – yep, they won. It was only long afterwards that I fully understood, like Wall Street and other gambling hubs, that the house fixes it. So, I don’t gamble….except (in my youthful past) I did gamble with ships in the night and sometimes won first place on slim odds before sinking into blissful euphoria after the statutory cigarette; but that’s another story.
I can enjoy the memories in my celibate dotage and merely observe the young blades placing their bets on the odd nag – but it’s all online now I understand and infested with less than the well-trained fillies of yesteryear.
Sad but true – an example of the 21st century way of doing these things – for entertainment only from the London scene:
https://www.standard.co.uk/comment/romance-scam-victims-conmen-tinder-swindler-netflix-b982838.html
You may think you are sneaking one past us, but as an old nag myself, I take serious offense!
LOL… fortunately I’m married to an old stud and we’ve both gone to pasture.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHJlWzKeFHU
Awesome Ghost – I just love country and added to this one gives me a winning combo for more strolling down memory lane – it’s 20.30 hours here and the living is easy back in the world:
I learned early to never gamble with money you can’t afford to lose.
Having said that, I’ve made and lost multi-thousands gambling. Set a limit before you lay that first dollar down, like $20 or $50. A hundred if you’re feeling frisky. If you lose it, walk away. If you win, then the trick is to pocket your original start before continuing, Then you’re playing on their money. If you can’t control it, then don’t even do it. Otherwise it will destroy you.
I’ve played all over Nevada, from little one-bar towns to Reno & Vegas. Monte Carlo, Paris, San Juan.. I’ve played in lot of the big places. Never hit Atlantic City, tho.
My best night ever was in Vegas. We were in Indian Springs, before the Air Force shut it down, working on an experimental ordnance, the ‘Big Eye’. Me and 4 others got there early the day before from VX-5 out of China Lake, to set up our shops. By mid-afternoon we were done and went up to the main casino in town to get something to eat/drink. Within a few minutes we all had hit good on whatever we were playing, after we were done eating. I hit on Blackjack ($200+), one hit big on the craps table, one hit big on roulette and one hit a couple hundred on a slot. One guy wasn’t drinking and didn’t gamble, but he was having fun watching us.
So, with him as the driver and general guard-dog, we headed to Vegas, about 60 miles away.
Long story short, I started with something like $450 in my pocket and set out the extra $200+ to lose or win with. We hit every casino in town and won everywhere we hit, on roulette, craps, slots and cards. When one went down, the others threw some chips his way. Always bounced back. We hit the strip clubs and threw money around like drunken sailors (which we were!), ate and drank like complete hedonists and spent, between all of us, about $6,000.
The next morning was difficult, but all but one was able to be at the hangar on time and actually do what we were supposed to do. He caught hell, but he was the main AO in charge of the ‘Big Eye’ so they didn’t mess with him too badly.
At the end, I had maybe $40 or $50 more than I had started with, and nobody came out a loser. One guy was almost $300 ahead.
By the time the driver told everyone about our night, we were squadron legends. Even the C.O. made a comment about it at the briefing the next day.
BTW, I don’t ever buy lottery tickets. Now it’s all the occasional poker game with friends.
Never ever gambled in the regular sense.
Bought maybe 40 lottery tickets in my lifetime.
For a while I put up to $5000, later $10,000 (altogether) on a stock I had a fancy for, but never on ones I’d see a real possibility of going to zero. Made a few bucks, but I’m completely out of the stock “market” since 2017.
A1:
Once I was at bar. It was last call and beer was $3.75 plus tip, so four bucks.
I had a buck fifty in my pocket… pumped it into the poker machine and was dealt a full house!
Best beer evah!
A2:
I have never found it entertaining.
I’ve been in The Car Repair Business for 50+ years. That’s enough of a daily-gamble for me. I’ll leave all the “games” to you and all the other experts.
Q1 The older I get the less I gamble on a lot of things. I used to enjoy blackjack when you could find either 2 0r 5 dollar tables. I would occasionally win or see others winning. Now with higher minimums (10,15,25) I rarely play because I never see anyone winning anymore. Occasional lottery ticket, video poker, no sports betting other than horses when I go to the actual track. ALWAYS have a limit and do it for entertainment purposes. No illusion of making a big win. If I come out ahead great if I lose well no one to blame but myself no one forced me to gamble.
Q2 Gambling is a vice and part of, in my opinion, our weakness as human beings. You could say the first bet was made by Adam in the garden of Eden. Did not turn out so well. It will always be with us because there will always be people willing to risk something for the possibility of more and people who will take advantage of that.
Q1: What is YOUR actual experience with gambling?
Used play poker years ago. I enjoy it because of the skill involved; as well as the application of strategy. But haven’t played in a long time.
One time, before we had kids, the wife and I were on vacation and I stepped up to play some roulette. We were in a casino, had tickets for a show, and I was just killing some time before the doors opened to the theater. In a matter of minutes, I turned $20 into $180 and the wife was giddy. In her mind, she had spent that money.
She was thinking: “We could get some souvenirs, clothes, and maybe see another show! Whoo hoo! My husband is AWESOME!”
But, then, a few minutes later I was down $60 and she became sort of depressed. “Why didn’t I just stop when I was ahead? What was wrong with me?”
Then the doors to the theater opened, and I decided to take the $60 loss and just walk away. It was a good lesson.
Q2: How do you feel ABOUT gambling?
I don’t gamble for fun or amusement at all. I will take risks in business, however, but only when I have some control over the outcome(s) and while never risking what I can’t afford to lose.
And, if I ever play roulette again (which I probably won’t), I will only do so if my wife is elsewhere and otherwise engaged, like if she was shopping or something like that.
1. Semi pro at it (sportsballs- never racing or casino games). Make about 4-4.5% per year, so I don’t mind.
2.Personal fucking responsibility.
1. Never really interested in it. Had a small trading account for awhile and discovered I wasn’t good at it.
2. I used to be more of a libertarian on things like gambling and drugs but our society is now structured so we all pay for the bad decisions of a few.
I was born into casino. So were you.
Stronger: casino’conception is how I got here. You, & every other roll of the dice, as well.
This is actual reality, not metaphor/eality.
So, anti-gambling ain’t pro-life.
But anti-stupid ain’t too realistic ~ life affirming ~ either. Accurate dx’n’s ok, but pulling the stick back into elevation-perspective, regularly, makes for smoother travel…& more profitable gambling.
(Monkey see/do emulation, Trojan horse “incentives”/word swallowing ~ these variations & plenty more ~ are also none too bright – but the queues to do go round the blocks: is-ness from which proceeds “let’s give ‘em the business.”)
As for addictive personalities…that’s biology, same as everything else, & addicts don’t choose to be addicts, don’t point at what they want to buy-ology & say “I’ll take addiction.” The come out roll – conception – “decides.”
I’ve been a student of the games ~ life ~ for most of my life.
First & foremost trick is finding your own edges ~ whatever you got on the come out roll ~ & then finding, or creating, games that contain at least the possibility of applying those edges. And then practicing those edges.
Bring your own edged game, even if it is to games invented by others. Just playing games you’ve been given to play the way you’ve been given to play them is the Vegas give-‘em-the-biz model.
Skill gambling, recreational gambling, addictive gambling, oblivious gambling – these are different things, different aspects, but the constant is, & remains, gambling.
So not gambling, like utopia, is not an option. Even no position, as the traders say, is a position. (“Yeah, well, sometimes nuthin’ can be a real cool hand.”) You are in, no matter what.
Gambling, you’re soaking in it (war/isk soaking, too, from yesterday’s title, gins up the vig, is why it’s such a vigorously consistent pursuit of “The House”… ).
Lumbar punctures & lies – correlation-coincidence-causation?
Flight combines some elements…war, children, it’s just a shot away ♪♫♪:
Not being from the US, I had no idea that gambling for minors is not allowed. I mean, when I was young, we were drinking in bars when we were 14 and there were always a few slot machines in the corner and nobody cared who used them. Cigarette machines on the roadside also just needed a few coins, not an I.D.
Anyhoo…a couple of years ago we took our children to see a movie. The movie theater was right next to a casino. You had to walk through the casino to get there, so as we were walking right past the slot machine floor, I told my son how slot machines work and that I would show him. We put a dollar bill in and I gestured for him to press the button, which he did. Then… we lost. A couple of seconds later, a nice security lady came over to tell me that he wasn’t allowed to gamble, being in elementary school and all. LOL. We just walked on to our movie theater. Later that day, our discussion continued about how “gambling is a rip off”, because the house always wins. Even now, two years later, our children still talk about how stupid gambling is, how quickly that one dollar disappeared, and how they would have rather spent it on a hot wheels car or a scoop of ice cream.
It might have been among the best dollars I have ever spent.
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The last time I gambled was in Atlantic City. Some friends and I went for some overnight fun. The very first casino and table I went to was the roulette table. I played black/red and even/odd starting with a $5 chip. I won and won and won. I then put it all on Red-19. I don’t remember how much I won but it was enough to pay for a steak dinner for 10 guys and that’s what I did with it.
I am not a gambler. In business yes, but not in the casinos.
Q1. I am a former Blackjack dealer, 3 years in Vegas. I really loved the job, I like games of kinds and I liked to meet people from other places. I like to hear and tell jokes so I was the friendly dealer who was having as good of a time as my players. I also learned to play Poker, 3-6-9, 2-4 and No-Limit Texas Hold’em. I would leave the casino I worked at and go to a casino that was close to home. I would play for a few hours, go home, get up for my 7pm to 3am shift and repeat. I won some nice side jackpots but at the end of each week, I would have the same amount of money, just wasted all my free time playing games. When I left Vegas, I had to switch mental gears and learn that having less than 1,000 cash on me didn’t mean I was broke!!
Q2. I feel that gambling, the way the casinos run it, allows folks to lose more than they should lose. I would sit down with a set number of chips and either lose them or double up and then I would leave. The Indian reservation casinos were built with the Vegas casino corporations. “If they can’t come to Vegas, let Vegas come to them.” So Vegas was half empty when I worked there 20 years ago. With the internet gaming now going on, poker slots and sportsbook betting is all available from the couch. Those businesses are making a killing. The only way to win at gambling is to never play. “Owning a casino is like having a rich uncle.” Planting up the garden is enough of a gamble for me.
Casinos are for fools and the lottery is just a state tax on the poor.
I gamble on billiards (kind of like golf) depending on how drunk I and/or the other guy is.
Win some, lose some, but the first rule is have fun.
, casinos are for idiots and the lottery is a tax on those who don’t pay taxes.
I’ll bet on a billiard game, if I’m playing.
My experience is that it isn’t really gambling if you’re only risking what you can afford to lose. At that level it’s just work, but when the amount on the line means I’m either going in style for a time or dead broke for months, that’s where the buzz is for me. Needless (maybe) to say, I haven’t gambled in years.
How I feel about gambling is it should not be significantly commercially available. It shouldn’t be illegal, just very substantially minimized. Way too many people don’t recognize their position versus the commercial establishments and way too many people lack the self awareness required to discipline themselves against this form of gluttony.
Anyone who wants to spend money regularly in gambling houses should keep a strictly honest account book, date, game(s) played, dollars in, dollars won or lost.
I used to make money in college betting on football. Never bet on my team, and looked for those that would, who I would take advantage of. Kinda like how it goes here – I make projections based on what I think will happen, not what I hope will happen.
I do not gamble. But if one must, take emotion out of it.
I’ve never thought governments can legislate morality. That being said, a question. Don’t casinos in some ways breed prostitution, drugs, etc., things evangelicals preach about then vote anyway for those in the business? Things we complain about coming across the southern border?
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