Why are
people attracted to gambling? What are
the pitfalls involved in the state regulation of gambling? Are these the same for India and Slovakia? Is there a difference between gambling which
involves some sort of skill and that which depends on pure luck? Can gambling teach you anything? Is it a social or anti-social activity?
Monday, November 1, 2021
Don’t be a Yudhishthir on Diwali
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There seem to be a lot of grey areas regarding gambling in India. The article states that Indian religious texts heavily discourage staking money on games, yet during the annual 4-5 day Diwali festival, the disapproval of gambling momentarily loses its rigour. The reason for why exactly I think this occurs is that despite the unequivocal fact that gambling paves the way to complete financial ruin, people still want to latch onto any reason that justifies it. Not only does gambling appeal to the brain’s constant longing for excitement and dopamine hits, it also provides monetary gain to the government via taxation, thus most people have a clear reason to excuse its popularity. In India specifically, gambling is further justified by the story mentioned in the article that “the Goddess Parvati played dice with her husband and enjoyed it so much that she decreed that whoever gambled on Diwali night would prosper throughout the coming year”. Thus, India at large finds it acceptable to gamble during the yearly occasion, in spite of the addictions that the activity very clearly creates.
ReplyDeleteAnother issue the article addresses is the common justification for gambling that some types of gambling rely more on a developed skill than pure luck. I personally do not see how this holds any relevance whatsoever. The main reason gambling is generally discouraged is that it makes it much easier for people to get addicted and thus possibly deplete themselves of all their monetary possessions. Furthermore, studies have shown that “people with a gambling problem were twice as likely to be depressed and 18 times more likely to experience severe psychological distress than people without a gambling problem”. The point I’m making is that if the act of betting money on any arbitrary game becomes a habit, how much luck is present throughout the process should not be a variable considered upon addressing how moral the act of placing bets during that game is. It is still gambling and it still creates addictions.
Dalibor, I undisputedly agree that a gambling addiction is a problem and that the government should try to incentivize people to not gamble. However, from my perspective it makes sense to close one eye during the Diwali festival as it is indeed a tradition dating back a long time ago. I believe that there is a need for traditions in a society as traditions and history keep a culture living. Even though the Diwali festival does possibly promote a bad habit, arguably so do the other traditions. One such example would be the washing of the dead bodies in the Ganges holy river, which gets increasingly polluted as the population grows. The Ganges holy river is not only used for cultural or religious purposes, but also is of great importance for fishing and drinkable water supply. This tradition clearly causes a bad outcome, but for hindu it is of utmost importance as the tradition is a key to reincarnation for the hindu. Similarly, the gambling during the Diwali festival is believed to bring financial prosperity. To conclude, in my opinion there is a great significance in preserving traditions, therefore we should continue important traditions even if there is a cost to it.
DeleteThis is a comment from Martin
ReplyDeleteThere are a few reasons why people may be attracted to gambling. I believe the most important one is that you can “win big with small amounts” - this totally distorts the mindset of gamblers and often makes them overly optimistic about the astronomically-small chances the house sets against them. With constant advertising and media coverage for decades, we have all heard of at least one instance of a “millionaire overnight” through gambling which tends to give us false hope. Other reasons may include relieving stress or socializing, as mentioned in the article, despite being told by parents that gambling is a one-way ticket to financial ruin, it is an extremely popular social activity during Diwali parties, where it is completely socially acceptable.
Gambling can teach you a valuable lesson, and this is especially true if you happen to lose all the money you deposited. You get this “high” feeling when you are winning, so you become more irrational with your bets. All of a sudden you start losing, but since you are still greedy for more, you keep increasing your bet size until you lose everything. This teaches you two main things: 1. Do not gamble as the house always wins, and 2. If you do happen to try and gamble, do not get greedy and rather withdraw early, as your luck will deplete soon if it has not already. I specifically said “when you lose everything” in the beginning, as if you are getting lucky and win a lot, you do not deal with any consequences of gambling. The problem is how maliciously all of this is set up. When you are winning, you do not fathom things like your bet size or the amount of time you have spent in the casino, and because of the house edge on almost every bet, mathematically speaking, the longer you play, the more you lose.
Although we are in the middle of a global pandemic and Diwali parties cannot be held, forms of online gambling have started to emerge over the last few years and they have been thriving as a result of the lockdown. One gambling app CEO even said that the number of players on their platform has risen by 30 percent during Diwali, making it very clear that there is a large amount of demand for gambling despite its bad reputation. Online gambling can become dangerous when it becomes unregulated through offshore crypto-currency casinos, which often do not have the proper age verification restrictions or self-exclusion mechanisms that regulated, offline casinos do have.
However, in games like poker and horse racing, and games like roulette or slot machines there is certainly a difference, these heavily rely on luck, whereas the prior rely more so on skill. In luck-based games, you cannot affect your outcome and there is house edge present, while on the contrary in skill-based games, there is little to no house edge, rather just an entry fee, and you can affect your outcome because of your preparation beforehand. In games like blackjack, there is a bit of a gray area - if you do “card counting” - a strategy used to determine whether the player or the dealer has an advantage on the next hand, and bet according to your calculations, even if it is legal, you will get kicked out of the casino. This makes you wonder, how much of an advantage is the casino really willing to give you — if any?
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ReplyDeleteI read this article. I think You put a lot of effort to create this article. I appreciate your work.
ReplyDeletePerkasa99
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