The Catalyst of Gambling

[Plenum]

this seems to be a continuation of my exploration of what is called "financial catalyst".

any gamblers here?  or gambled in the past?  did it get you into financial strife and even debt?

I come from a Chinese culture.  There, gambling is not considered in any way a 'sin' or a 'vice'.  It's just accepted.  In the same way that smoking is still a big part of chinese culture.  The question doesn't even come up.

Both my parents gambled.  My mother played mahjong for money.  My father gambled on the horse-racing.  It was a regular thing.  Two or three times a week.

I've dabbled with the lottery myself a couple of times in my life.  Never spent more than $20 on a ticket though.  It seems like any more than that was a 'serious investment', and one that you knew you were going to lose.

There seems to be a stereotype that the lower-income groups buy scratchies and lottery tickets; and that those with more income go to the actual casinos.  

I remember watching two awesome Gambling films about 10 years ago:

1) Owning Mahowny - Canadian film, based on a true story (apparently)
2) The Cooler

I'm sure people have known someone in real life who had their life destroyed by a gambling catalyst that got way out of hand.

[Rhayader]

I started frequenting the local casinos last year after avoiding it for a long time. My mum used to go all the time. She tends to win a lot quite quickly...then throw it all away. So yeah its quite addicting. There is definitely an exciting element to it. I was trying to analyze the idea of luck and the energy in the casinos is fascinating. I had my moments but you usually end up losing in the long run. I would go more but im out of money and have no income, so have nothing spare to waste!

[Jade]

Sometimes my husband plays FanDuel (daily fantasy sports gambling) but he feels guilty sometimes, though he has won more than he has spent. He won a decent amount of money one of his first games so he's been playing off of that, a few dollars a day, mostly breaking even. I think he's giving it up for baseball season for the time being though and going to hold out until football season, which is more predictable (and he's more familiar with and skilled at fantasy football).

He treats it very lightly, though, so I trust that he won't get too intense (and that he'd listen to me if I thought he did). It's more like a video game where he inputs x amount a month and then tries to get a high score, which could eventually equal a payout. Gambling has never been my thing (his either) but he does have the touch with fantasy sports, haha.

My grandpa and my uncle always liked to gamble and were very good at it, hitting several large (5 digit) jackpots at the casino in their lifetimes. I have an old coworker who the joke was that he would gamble on anything - he even used to work at the casino - but he was pretty good at it (craps) and won a lot more than he lost, actually. Him and another guy would bet high/low on all the PBR caps at the end of a shift (PBR bottle caps have playing card on them - ace of hearts, 6 of spades, etc). The emotional swing of competition was irresistible to them.

[Matt1]

People Gamble here, but i have never really been into it. I would rather play something like Magic the gathering than poker.

[Diana]

There is also the distinction, risk-taker. For instance, entrepreneurs must take risks and they "gamble" all the time that what they are pouring their energy into will yield something (it's not blind gambling as they have presumably though things out). This is an aspect of creative energy— to create something one may take risks. 

So if a society has no entrepreneurs or risk-takers in this way, things could get pretty stagnant.

[AnthroHeart]

Even in Star Trek: TNG they gamble at times playing poker.

[AnthroHeart]

I haven't gambled at a casino because the closest one is like 100+ miles away. Only the lotto is legal here.

[Reaper]

I've gambled small sums before but didn't really enjoy it. The prospect of losing my hard-earned money makes me too nervous. Probably the closest I've come to having a gambling addiction was buying packs of Magic the Gathering cards and hoping for some super foil rare...and that had to stop once my mortgage payment came into being.

[Reaper]

I remember when I worked the customer service desk at Kroger, people would buy scratch offs, win a fairly decent sum of money, then spend all their winnings on more scratch offs. They'd wind up losing all the money they made and then some. It was very depressing to watch.

[BlatzAdict]

People engage in a mindset culture and take actions based on disparity. so I would ask what was rich about it?

I've been thinking similar thoughts playing this game Fallout New Vegas Recently and you live in this post apocalyptical world and everything is disparate, there are haves and have nots, in most of these games created by the same company bethesda there is always a gambling game inside the game itself. like in the game world these people are playing a card game. It's interesting though I feel a meh thinking about trying it out.

I understand what you mean what is the point of winning money only to spend it on the same thing again. They maybe must not have any other hopes and dreams to spend their money on.