The gambling factor: Why it’s so toxic

The gambling factor: Why it’s so toxic

Las Vegas; its cousin mecca in Macau, China; and other casinos shall never tell you why they preserve their strictest code of silence. The primary objective is to keep the casino’s house odds of winning versus the gambler’s odds concealed to protect what’s in it for them: profits. The gambling system is designed in such a way as to take money from the poorest to the wealthiest patrons, and everyone in between, while simultaneously—and fictionally—showing favoritism in their direction.

They create the illusion that the odds are in the customer’s favor. It is their prejudicial intent, from the very moment potential gamblers enter the casino doors, to cross and undermine all of them under the pretext of credibility. Of course, they’ll make everyone think that gamblers are, righteously, the beloved champions, regardless of how most of them are bound to become compulsive gamblers, not unlike the way in which the tobacco company has successfully trapped smokers. The house always has a tremendous advantage of perhaps between 90 to 95 percent versus a slanted 5 to 10 percent toward betting visitors. This is a mere range: it could also be less or more.

I realize I’m making the point that the true odds are kept a secret, but scholars in mathematics/probability/statistics fields often focus on gaming and give much lower odds ratios—they clearly are on the side of the house, but the usual slant is more along the lines of 5 percent or less (e.g., see https://gaming.unlv.edu/casinomath.html).

Maybe it’d be better I steer clear of statistics and simply note that the odds ratios are always in favor of the house (especially in the long run), or casinos wouldn’t exist. I’m of the mindset that a healthy lifestyle is the foundation for peak well-being and excludes uncontainable gambling, smoking, drug use, pills, and heavy alcohol intake. Otherwise, the situation may become toxic and may lead to the person in question doing these don’ts: exploitation, misrepresentation, mischaracterization, or spreading mendacious and unproven rumors. The danger is that one becomes rendered in a position that is nearly impossible to get out of until the casino cleans that person out to the last cent and pits them against old lenders.

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