Banning VLTs

[Fighting Madd]

I've been reading about these folks who blame VLTs for their financial ruin. Now these "victims" and their families want VLTs banned or at best restricted to casinos.

IMO, it's time for people to take 100% responsbility for their own actions. Why expect governments to save you whenever you screw up your life. The vast majority of people gamble a little and then stop. If you blow your food money on gambling, that's your problem.

Of course, some may ask why our governments allow gambling at all? Isn't it just an "idiot tax" on those who can't help themselves? We may suggest that the government knows it's targetting the poor and the stupid by placing the VLTs in low end bars. But then, why not demand that government ban smoking, alcohol and anything else that will do you harm when in access?

 

[urbanboyto]

Addictions are a powerful set of responses that are incredibly hard to overcome. Would you have the same reaction to all alcholics or drug addicts? Are they all just losers who only have themselves to blame? Or is there another set of circumstances at work do you think?

And by the way..yes that is why the government regulates smoking, alchohol and drugs. They are dangerous, addictive substances. Gambling is not any different.

It is a strange situation that the government makes money off of regulating, providing controlled services for these activities. To me that is the problem, not the victims of the system.

 

[Fighting Madd]

Would you have the same reaction to all alcholics or drug addicts? Are they all just losers who only have themselves to blame?

Of course you have only yourself to blame. No one forced you to start your activity before it became addictive.

And by the way..yes that is why the government regulates smoking, alchohol and drugs.

The government hardly regulates smoking or alchohol other than to set an age of legal entry and public safety restrictions (no DWI or smoking in public spaces for example). The government does nothing to control addiction to either smoking or drinking. If you want to spend your entire paycheque on booze and smokes, go ahead. The next item on the political agenda seems to be the legalization of narcotics, which will result in tax revenue on drug addicts.

To me that is the problem, not the victims of the system.

Come on. Do you not hold these folks responsible at all for their actions? Surely, you must hold them at least partially accountable? IMO they're not victims, other than to their own lack of self control. If I rob you, IMO you're a victim. If you gamble away your own money, IMO you're not a victim no more than someone who spends his money without forethough or commonsense.

 

[bizorky]

A sad issue, but what else should be banned in society because some people become "addicted?" Would that mean anything that a small number of people do to excess?

I am very dubious concerning the idea of "gambling addiction" being the same as drug addiction. The latter falls into a class of substances that have a measurable impact on the brain. Gambling, in my opinion, is something quite different than a chemical acting on the brain.

Yes, some people have problems with gambling. But this an issue that belongs to the individual, as in they may have a particular form of mental illness. Society as a whole does not invite, force or condone people into being irresponsible with their money, yet every adult has a choice to do so. I think the real issue concerns the money. If there was a VLT "addiction" with no money involved, no one would really notice it.

If people want to gamble, they don't need VLT's. Should cards be outlawed?

Some people are "addicted" to surfing the web (well, at least where I work), should the internet be banned?

 

[mpolo2]

I think I am for them as VLT and those scratch-and-wins people in front of me in line are always buying are essentially a tax on the mathematically challenged. And given Canada's excessive penchant for re-distributing money to those people anyway I am ok with it. It is sort of our way of tricking them into giving the money back!

 

[afransen TO]

Well, gambling does cause changes in brain chemistry, though in a more indirect way than with drugs. I don't think there is any reason to class it differently in terms of addictiveness.

 

[bizorky]

VLT's are then a "controlled" substance already.

I'd like to see the evidence for "brain changing" due to VLT's. What would that be caused by? A misplaced sense of excitement at the prospect of winning something?

 

[Archivistower]

I've always been opposed to state-sponsored gambling in general, but essentially have been willing to live with it. VLTs do seem to be the worst form this can take, however.

Whatever the arguments about the responsiblities of the people involved and whether or not there is a physical characteristic to what is clearly an addiction, it seems to me to be wrong to prey on weakness in society for financial gain. What VLTs do to people (and gambling in general, especially given the nature of the advertisements for it) is not morally different from someone going door to door selling fake insurance policies to easily fooled older people.

People like Madd always make me think of Alberta farmers. All proud self-control and self-reliance until something happens to them personally (like a crop failure), when they suddenly turn their quivering beaks to all-providing mommagovernment and cheep-cheep-cheep for sustenance.

 

[Brighter Hell]

The next item on the political agenda seems to be the legalization of narcotics, which will result in tax revenue on drug addicts.

marijuana's not addictive.

 

[Fighting Madd]

People like Madd always make me think of Alberta farmers. All proud self-control and self-reliance until something happens to them personally (like a crop failure), when they suddenly turn their quivering beaks to all-providing mommagovernment and cheep-cheep-cheep for sustenance.

When disaster strikes, any community would turn towards its government for guidance and assistance. That's why we pay taxes for emergency services, national defence and national healthcare. Why pick on Alberta farmers of all people?

Getting back on topic...if you gamble away all your money, that's your problem. Get some self control and get some control over your life. Jeez, people are always looking to blame someone else for their own mess.

 

[bizorky]

Hmm,

There is a significant difference between enduring a natural disaster and seeking aid, and choosing to gamble on the basis of wanting to win money.

 

[Fighting Madd]

There is a significant difference between enduring a natural disaster and seeking aid, and choosing to gamble on the basis of wanting to win money.

I couldn't have said it better. If you lose your money because you gave it away, it's not the government's job to bail you out.

In fact, if you're family is now out of food and house because you blew the income on gambling, don't be surprised if the government you look towards doesn't send in Child Protective Services to collect your children and doesn't garnish your wages to pay your spousal and child support.

 

[urbanboyto]

Please do some reading on addiction. If you would do so you would see that narcotics, caffeine, internet surfing, gambling are all symptoms of larger problems of addiction, of filling a void, of distraction.

 

[bizorky]

Please do some reading yourself and you would quickly note significant differences between the ingestion of narcotics and other substances and activities like gambling and internet surfing. Just because people choose to use the word "addiction" does not mean it is all the same. If one were to follow your reasoning we could ban just about everything since there is no doubt some small group of individuals who claim to be "addicted."

 

[urbanboyto]

ok you are connecting what I wrote about addiction with "banning" of VLT's.

I maintain that addictive behaviours are connected to other problems. The addictions are symptoms of the problems. That is how I consider problem gambling to be an addiction on the order of drug or alchohol addiction but I do recognize there are some differences.

All I am saying is that blaming the victims of these addictions as not being "up to snuff" is not the way to go.

VLT's should be controlled (but I would admit that I personally think those things should just be banned..what good are they?). I also do not think the government should be making tax revenues from these activities.