Toronto Union Park | 303.26m | 58s | Oxford Properties | Pelli Clarke Pelli

No one is arguing that we should massively promote alcohol consumption in order to fund public transit. As usual your point is incoherent.

Um, except that is exactly what it does.

From the LCBO's own website:
In fiscal 2011-12, LCBO sales topped $4.7 billion and it delivered a $1.63 billion dividend to the Ontario government, not including taxes. This revenue helps pay for health care, education and other important services.

The LCBO and OLG are very similar beasts. They both generate revenue for the state to subsidize social programs by monopolizing "vice". To condemn one and not the other is hypocritical.

A casino will not ruin downtown Toronto. It's over-dramatic to suggest otherwise. You all must have zero confidence in regulatory bodies and law enforcement.
 
Um, except that is exactly what it does.

From the LCBO's own website:


The LCBO and OLG are very similar beasts. They both generate revenue for the state to subsidize social programs by monopolizing "vice". To condemn one and not the other is hypocritical.

A casino will not ruin downtown Toronto. It's over-dramatic to suggest otherwise. You all must have zero confidence in regulatory bodies and law enforcement.


Agree 100%. This sounds more like prohibition era USA than modern day Canada. Are we really going to ban every facet of life that has some negatives associated with it? Not only is gambling part of the modern world, but our government is already neck deep in it. Get the morality police out of the decision making process.

I lived in Halifax when they built their downtown casino and the sky didn't fall. Their casino added to the vibrancy of downtown Halifax and added to the entertainment options available there. It wasn't some last ditch effort made by a depressed city either. I don't gamble at all, but support a downtown casino for Toronto on principle alone. Nanny state? No thanks.
 
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Um, except that is exactly what it does.

From the LCBO's own website:


The LCBO and OLG are very similar beasts. They both generate revenue for the state to subsidize social programs by monopolizing "vice". To condemn one and not the other is hypocritical.

A casino will not ruin downtown Toronto. It's over-dramatic to suggest otherwise. You all must have zero confidence in regulatory bodies and law enforcement.

Bullshit. The LCBO provides alcohol millions of times more responsibly than a private mega casino would administer gambling.

People here are saying that both of those issues are delicate and need to be done sensitively. As I said before, if instead of a casino we were getting a giant LCBO-run nightclub with cheap drinks geared to creating provincial revenue while externalising costs into the local community, the opposition to that development would be just as strong.

It's just a stupid way to build a city, regardless of which vice you are building your business model around.

If you look at all the deaths and problems associated with alcohol and that makes you want to regulate it further, be my guest... But to argue that since we as a society are fine with the disastrous effects of alcohol, we therefore should be fine with the disastrous effects of increased gambling is as pathetic an argument I've ever heard.

P.S. Prohibition was ended when LOCAL COMMUNITIES demanded access to alcohol in their neighbourhoods. If Cityplace residents ever demand access to improved gambling facilities, we should provide them no doubt.
 
Bullshit. The LCBO provides alcohol millions of times more responsibly than a private mega casino would administer gambling..

Ah, yes. The great, the benevolent, the caring, Liquor Control Board of Ontario.

Full disclosure: my grandfather was a former commissioner of the LCBO in the 1960s. And today, my grandmother still enjoys a pretty pension from that

The whole "social responsibility" argument is just a weaker version of the prohibitionist argument. It's an argument against individual agency, and a belief that only "public" interests can ameliorate the bad consequences of alcohol and drug consumption. "Private" interests are always purely egoist, and often malevolent.

Philosophizing aside, I have a question: how many people here, who grew up in Ontario, actually had trouble obtaining liquor before they were nineteen? Go ahead and raise your hand... yeah, me either. Funny that.

Prohibition against adults doesn't work. And it doesn't really work against minors, either; they steal it from their parents. They get nineteen year old brothers/sisters to buy it for them, they do any number of clever things. But the LCBO's "social responsibility" is but a minor impedance to them.

You go to Germany, Austria, France, Spain, Portugal, and nobody gives a shit about this stuff. Yet, based on the logic of these pro-LCBO Light Prohibitionists like RC8, these societies should be in advanced states of social decay due to excessive alcohol consumption.

The only other angle on this, is the insane profit windfall the government gets from its alcohol monopoly. Which is pretty perverse, if you ask me. The whole base assumption of "needing" the LCBO is that the venomous private sector will turn every unsuspecting citizen into an alcohol abuser.

The homeless native Canadian who lives near me, bums money off people, and loads up on liquor at the LCBO every day is really benefiting from this *awesome*, socially responsible system.

But for anyone whose not a knee-jerk, pro-government type, you can already sense the perverse incentives at play. Not only is the government monopolizing the market, but it too, better than any private sector player could ever hope to, is squeezing as much profit out of the enterprise that it can. It advertises in the newspaper, on TV, on billboards for more of the serfs to come get their liquor fix. It brags as the sales volume increases year over year.

The Government of Ontario is, quite frankly, an alcohol-pusher. Just like it's a gambling-pusher.

Don't worry though. It's a pusher in a good way. Because it's "public".

Yeah, f$%k off.
 
All the countries you mentioned have higher rates of alcohol consumption per capita than Canada or Ontario. If the government of Ontario is pushing alcohol, it's doing a lousy job.

P.S. I'm actually anti-LCBO and I've been drinking casually with my family since I was 13. I hate how we deal with alcohol in North America, but the LCBO is millions of times more responsible than the OLG.
 
All the countries you mentioned have higher rates of alcohol consumption per capita than Canada or Ontario. If the government of Ontario is pushing alcohol, it's doing a lousy job.

P.S. I don't like how we deal with alcohol, but the LCBO is millions of times more responsible than the OLG.

"millions of times more responsible". Please, elaborate.

Also, you state the alcohol consumption per capita as some sort of proof. It assumes that I think people having a few more pints is inherently a moral wrong. I don't share this premise with you.
 
See my edit above.

The LCBO doesn't try to build mega-establishments onto unwilling communities to clear a provincial deficit while lobbying the hell out of local politicians, for example!

If the LCBO was building pubs, bars, and nightclubs in residential neighbourhoods to increase alcohol consumption, and if they were plastering the city and media with ads encouraging drinking, and if they were selling their products at corner stores and targeting low-income demographics... then they'd be on par with the OLG.

I don't like our approach to alcohol, but it sure beats our approach to gambling. Ontario has a disproportionately high rate of gambling addicts directly as a result of the OLG's techniques.

Finally, I'll add that alcohol consumption in N. America is more sensitive than in Europe because everyone here drives everywhere - which means that our per capita alcohol-related fatalities are usually quite high directly as a result of drunk driving. I never drive, but I understand why it's an issue, and why increased consumption can lead to more deaths.
 
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The LCBO DOES advertise everywhere! The advertise on the side of buildings, they advertise on billboards and bus stops! The do glossy magazines and brochures ALL ABOUT DRINKING BOOZE.

Where are the stats that there is a disproportionate amount of problem gamblers here?

Why are problem gamblers more important than problem drinkers?

Why do people think that the sky is going to fall, we will ALL turn into raging gamblers, thieves, whore-mongers, rapists, kidnappers or drug addicts if ANOTHER avenue to gamble is added to the many that are in our midst within downtown Toronto?

I can do off track betting in downtown Toronto, I don't think there has been any shootouts at any of the off track betting places around town. Or at any of the libraries (or any other place in, well the WORLD) where you can gamble online, or any of the Lotto sellers. Has there been a proliferation thieves, whore-mongers, rapists, kidnappers or drug addicts at Woodbine? Or Casino Rama? Why if we put one at Front and Spadina then is the world all of a sudden going to end? Why are people so certain that a week after a casino goes in (if it does) I will quit my job on Bay St. to go sling crack rock and pimp out a stable of girls while kidnapping some tourist to rape?!? Because quite frankly I don't see it.

Will it draw more pan handlers and people living on the street? Like moths to a flame. Will it attract problem gamblers? If it's easier to get to then WHERE THEY GAMBLE NOW, and has the games they like etc. Then yes, maybe it will. Will it attract thousands of tourists, allow a convention centre that sorely needs updating to get it, will it attract other types of entertainment, hotel stays, revenue for the city, tourist dollars, some wonderful new public outdoor spaces, some worldclass retail, some iconic architecture?

All signs point to yes.
 
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It's nice that some people feel inclined to enthusiastically embrace casino boosterism, but that's hardly definitive proof that all will be well if we do a downtown casino.

In any case, I think council is going to vote it down. And the convention centre is going to get some positive attention regardless. Should we fail to get a brand spankin' new casino somewhere in the centre core, I am nonetheless certain the sky will not fall.
 
Soooo many pages since the last post about the actual development itself. There is a thread for casino debates regarding ethics and location, and I am sure there is even a thread about the LCBO - but aside from the fact that Oxford Place is one of the potential casino location candidates, shouldn't this thread talk about the project in question? I am all for a good debate but this is the projects and construction section - and threads exist for all these tangents...I mean topics
 
Good point. But the cross-posting is perhaps a wee bit understandable, given the magnitudes of passion the very topic of casinos themselves arouse. Kind of difficult to separate projects from one's opinion of casinos, good or bad. And for the most part, the discussion has been fairly civil, if not occasionally strained.
 
I hope all of you who are pro-casino have let your local councillor know you hope they will support it in a vote. I did!
 
Soooo many pages since the last post about the actual development itself. There is a thread for casino debates regarding ethics and location, and I am sure there is even a thread about the LCBO - but aside from the fact that Oxford Place is one of the potential casino location candidates, shouldn't this thread talk about the project in question? I am all for a good debate but this is the projects and construction section - and threads exist for all these tangents...I mean topics

It's very hard to ignore non-logical arguments, though - when they are repeated over and over again.

I can't wait 'til the casino is struck down by council so that we can focus on the features of this project that can be a great asset to this community! But while councillors are making up their minds, it's important to tackle the sort of opinions that encourage our councillors to vote against city-building.

See the guy above who asks "where are the stats that there is a disproportionate amount of problem gamblers here?", even though a simple google search would enlighten him. He then asks "why are problem gamblers more important than problem drinkers?" even though no one has suggested that, and problem drinkers are irrelevant to this discussion.

Casino proposing non-logic says:

1.It's not the end of the world, and since I don't live next to it, we must embrace it.
2.We NEED it to pay for things that would in all likeliness pay for themselves anyway... but still!
3.It's immoral to let people die and be abused by the alcohol industry and not by the casino industry. Either we abuse everyone, or no one!
4.Downtown residents are not residents like, you know... the ones where I live.
5.Downtown neighbourhoods are not like, you know... the one where I live.
6.We is gettin' soopertaaallz! And I'm getting a new destination within driving distance :cool:
7.Who would raise kids in the city anyway?
8.Smaller casinos more responsibly administered and tightly regulated than the one proposed in Toronto haven't been that bad for other cities. Bigger casinos more similar to the one proposed in Toronto, often run by the same people, where crime is notorious... is anecdotal evidence championed by the left wing media.
9. The government should stay out of our bedrooms... and impose a giant gambling monopoly upon an unwilling neighbourhood.
10. We can subsidise the 'burbs with a casino, and increased crime in productive downtown neighbourhoods that subsidise the 'burbs anyway is just a small price to pay.

I will stop arguing now. I will simply refer back to this post in this thread, and direct people to the OLG thread in Toronto Issues.
 
Can the ongoing debate about casinos be moved to the Toronto issues thread.

This thread should be specific to the development of Oxford Place, which will likely proceed in some form sans a casino component. The current discussion is so off topic. Surely I'm not the only one that doesn't want to read about LCBO.

A friendly request.
 

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