Gambling in its myriad forms is one of the most popular ways of entertainment, and one of the most lucrative businesses around the world. Year after year, we spend trillions of dollars on all kinds of gambling, be it the lottery, scratch cards, card games, casinos, sports betting or something else, in the hope of hitting the jackpot, or at least winning a substantial amount of money. But how much sense does it make and what benefit does it all have for ourselves and our societies?
As a matter of fact, gambling in its various forms moves, engages, entertains and annoys people, or even drives them to their graves, so it is a phenomenon that can provoke quite extreme reactions. One reason for this is that gambling is usually about money or some other material stake, which can be a powerful motivator. On the one hand, this means that we don’t want to lose our money or stake, and, on the other, we often have unrealistic hopes of winning, when the chances of doing so – which we are usually unaware of – are very small in most cases. It is generally true that the lower the probability of success, the higher the potential payoff, which can easily distort our own realistic assessment of the odds in our favor.
The other main reason for extreme gambling-related behavior is the game itself, or the chance to win, which triggers primal instincts in us, especially if we are men. While it’s true that winning can quickly become intoxicating, leading to irresponsible actions, our brains actually produce dopamine (a neurotransmitter that makes us feel good and excited) even when we lose, which subconsciously encourages us to keep playing. This in turn often leads to losing all the money we have gambled with, while some people even get themselves into very serious debt because they simply cannot stop. By the time one becomes motivated by the hope of winning back everything they have lost through gambling, we can clearly refer to them as an addict.
Gambling addiction is an extremely serious and widespread problem in society today, with a really negative impact on the lives of many. Examples include stress, depression, ill health, irritability, poverty, homelessness and, potentially, suicide. However, the harmful effects do not only have consequences for those who participate in gambling, as they can also indirectly affect their family members, loved ones, friends or even co-workers. On the one hand, gamblers who accumulate significant debts can take others down with them financially, whether they are friends or family trying to help them out, but family breakdown, violence, estrangement or divorce are also quite common.
However, it is far from certain that the rare lucky ones who suddenly find themselves with a huge windfall fair much better. While it is true that such an event can change some people’s lives in a positive way, many are plagued by what is known only as the ‘lottery winners’ curse‘. A common reason for this is that those who have never had much money are usually not able to manage it properly.
Extraordinary wealth, compared to the past, can easily go to one’s head, making one think of oneself as the king of the world, leading to irresponsible decisions. As well as the stress of handling large sums of money, the fact that most people have a different attitude to the winner than they used to can be a major problem. On the one hand, because of all the money that has been thrown at them undeservedly, and on the other, out of pure interest to make sure that they are not left out of the good, for which they are sometimes capable of doing the most despicable things.
And while it is a fact that – in more developed countries at least – there is plenty of information and help available to deal with such mental and lifestyle issues, we ought to see that the real beneficiaries of gambling are not particularly interested. Nor do they mind that gambling is not actually designed for the players to win a lot, but essentially for their own benefit and financial gain. The goal is, expressly or tacitly, to ‘rip off’ players, meaning to make them pour as much money as possible into the game, which in the vast majority of cases will not pay off, while the game operators make a huge profit.
Although the operators and beneficiaries of gambling are essentially as opportunistic as the players themselves who ‘try their luck’, there is a fundamental difference between the two – namely that the former organize the games, while the latter are passive sufferers on an individual level, all of this with the general approval of society. Of course, most of the companies involved, and obviously most of the politicians, say that grown-up people are aware of their own actions when they gamble, thus placing all of the responsibility on them. But is it really true that we are always completely in control of our own decisions? If so, why are we constantly being manipulated? As a matter of fact, through the means of marketing, they are actually doing everything they can to get people addicted, whether or not they warn you about the risks and dangers of gambling.
The biggest problem is that they are not only harming gamblers, but society as a whole. If you think about it, drastically influencing and changing people’s behavior, promoting their addiction to gambling, is essentially no different from distributing drugs, which is condemned and severely punished in most countries. Although the sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages is generally much less strictly regulated – while just like gambling, it also generates significant revenues -, drink-driving is not usually treated with much leniency by the authorities. In light of this, and the fact that drug use is illegal in most places, it is perhaps legitimate to ask why gambling is not.
Of course, banning all gambling alone would not be enough to solve the problem, as we also need to eliminate the need and the temptation to gamble. This can be achieved by providing adequate, detailed and realistic information, and by educating children from an appropriate age, both at home and in educational institutions, to consciously steer them in a different direction. In fact, there are countless activities other than gambling or betting that can keep us busy or entertained while being much more useful, or at least not harmful. When someone’s life revolves around gambling to the extent that they can’t imagine it without anymore, they may well have serious identity issues, so it’s important to understand the basic aspects of identity, as well.
Overall, as long as gambling is legal, we cannot really talk about living in a civilized society. There are three main reasons for this:
- It makes people ‘crazy’ in one way or another (irritability and other kinds of extreme behavior, addiction, etc.), which causes them not to act in a civilized way.
- The fact that some people, essentially without any real merit, acquire considerable wealth mainly by chance or luck (but always with minimal effort), while others never really have the opportunity (since not everyone can be a winner, after all), is an infinitely unfair thing, absolutely incompatible with the concept of civilized coexistence.
- Gambling is fundamentally never in the interests of the players, but of the speculators and those in power – both because they are the ones who make a lot of money on it, and because it is an excellent tool for enforcing the ‘divide and conquer’ principle in society. (It’s no coincidence that mafias are usually involved in gambling, too.)
Gambling is therefore a typical example of how existential opportunism works in our allegedly civilized societies. In fact, it’s just a massive rip-off, which is a big part of the way in which a minority can continually prey on and dominate the majority of people. Sure, it does generate jobs and tax revenue – but it also has to be seen that these would not be needed at all with much more useful and meaningful jobs and a much more equal and fair distribution of wealth.