What's wrong with gambling?
 

I'm starting this thread at the invitation of another poster who had questions. I'm not going to post a whole bunch of stuff on the initial post, but suffice it to say that I have been politcally active in the state of Ohio for almost 20yrs to keep casino gambling from becoming legal. With the help of the Lord, we have been typically outspent over 10-1 in money and have won 2-1 at the ballot.

The government has no business being in the gambling business. It is a regressive tax which preys on those who can least afford it. It places the government's fiscal irresponsibilty on the backs of those who earn the least without regard for their welfare except to throw them a "bone" by using a miniscule portion of the revenues for problem gamblers.

it isnt gambling if you win?

It isn't gambling if you're assured of winning. :D

Would you consider hedging commodities gambling? I have heard that preached before but it did not sit right with me

I have inhaled this vice and found it almost immediately exhilarating.

I thank God that I got seriously "hustled" in a dreary basement with a load of cash on the rickety ping-pong table.

Before my meeting the darker elements of gambling, all I wanted to know every Friday, Saturday and Sunday was...."where's the game" and "what's the stakes".

I could never have understood (or believed) how euphoric wining was; leaving with a big old bulging wad of cash that you counted about 5 times before going to bed,
or how belittling it is to have to take your watch and shoes off to cover a pot that already had your endorsed, uncashed paycheck sitting in the big middle.

Thank you Jesus!
Thank you Jesus!
Thank you Jesus!
…for delivering me from the snare of the excitement and the lust of thinking I was going get something for nothing as long as the chumps kept seeing and raising.

All the while I was just being groomed to be the next chump in line.

Luck is such an enticing lie.

Professionals call that euphoric feeling the "chase." It is what drives gamblers to keep forking it over. The BIG win is just around the corner, they can feel it. You can't smell in on their breath or their clothes. It is a silent killer that destroys families and sometimes literally kills children. (more than one mother has left her child in the car with the windows up in blistering heat)

Wow! One of 3? states that hasn't fallen!

Gambling is an insidious family- destroying vice that sucks in its potential victims and their families before they even have time to realize that winning that first substantianal windfall was the worst thing that ever happened to them.

Christians are especially vulnerble because they think that its ok because they don't have other vices such smoking, drinking, drugs or extra-marital affairs. Besides that the buffets are such a bargain!

I have watched families crying in the courtroom because dad had quickly fallen and taken the family down with him. Divorce was the wife's only hope to preserve the family home for her children.

I have talked to parents whose children wiped out their joint bank account so they could play at the casino. I have talked to children who found out to late that their elderly mother was now destitude having spent her retirment nest egg on the slot machines.

Unlike alcohol or drugs; a gambling problem can bring about destitude at a far greater speed. It certainly robs the self esteem/ self worth of the person caught in its grip.

We had a police officer put a gun to his head and pull the trigger right at the casino table. The casino closed that floor down for a few hours while they cleaned up the mess and then they re-opened that floor for business as usual.

Gambling is big business for lawyers. Divorce attorneys, criminal attorneys and bankruptcy attorneys. But hey! The food is great at the buffet.... :cool:

Gambling...let me just say it ain't good.

Enuf said !

There is a reason this activity had previously only been engaged in by the Mob. It is a vice on par with prostitution is its addiction.

The problem with gamblings is that I lose all my money!

I personally can't imagine anybody getting caught up with gambling. It's something I've never been the least interested in. I can't imagine taking the chance of losing money for no good reason.

I agree you with.....it is awful though how some people become soo consumed with it! I'm not just going to throw away money....No way Ho say.... I need my 4.29 for my starbucks habit.

I know a man who literally lost his house, his family, his vehicles, and everything else he owned because of a gambling habit. And he was a professing Christian, who just got caught up in the addiction of it. It's hard for me to even fathom, but then I have never gotten close to it, so I don't know how I'd react.

We won't even do cakewalks (where you have to pay) or raffles or anything like that, because literally those are gambling and we try to stay away from any form of it. Maybe that's legalistic in a sense, but I think you have to draw a line somewhere.

Woo hoo!!! Did I finally make the legalism list?????:highfive

When you win you may be taking the money of some poor slub who needed to buy his kids some food.

Sherri, We just love Jeff and Tammi Butler and their church.

Nathan Eckstadt

that's okay bro,,,,,,,you can trade your nice car in for something a lil less expensive and go buy them some food.....now see, you are a good man!!!:killinme :heeheehee

I think Eddie's preaching there in a few weeks.

It would take an Angel from heaven to tell me I needed to sell the car. Maybe if it was my kids that needed the food.........

:ranting those kids are crying and they are hungry....go get em something bro... you are closer to them right now than I am!!!! :killinme

The only gambling we do is church cake-walks and maybe a benefit raffle. I have ALWAYS come out ahead. (we're not gambling - just a fun way to give).

What's wrong with gambling?
 

I would lose all my money.

I have heard preachers that said the Stock Market was a form of gambling...

What do you folks think?

So is getting in your car each morning. Getting married, taking a new job etc..

I understand what you are saying...

Gambling is a transfer of payment from one person to another without actual value added. One out of two gamblers cannot afford to be transferring their money and the majority of gamblers are ultimately going to lose.

In contrast the stock market is the creation of capital that supplies jobs and produce goods and services. Most people who are diversified in the stock market and stay with it long enough will make money not lose it.

However, day traders are an entirely different matter. It could be argued that daytrading is similar and dissimilar to gambling and stock market ownership. It would depend upon the totality of the situation to find which catagory a person's day trading lined them up with.... :cool:

Thanks for your response, Newman. I asked both men that I have heard preach against it, WHY they considered it wrong, and neither one explained it as well as your post...

Appreciate it.

The lottery is a tax on the mathmatically challenged.

Well, if you're legalistic in this, I am too. That is the stance I take as well. :D

You guys are just a bunch of legalists.

Quote me bible that says gambling is wrong!!!

The apostles drew lots to see who got to be the replacement for Judas. That is a kind of lottery!!

Just because a few WEAK people can't handle it is no reason to place any unfair restriction on anyone else

Yeah, I BET!

Mrs. Pianoman has got a plan on gambling! :)

She buys ten lottery tickets each week. Each day she gives two tickets to the employee who performed best that day, but they have to meet a certain daily quota! If noboby reaches their quota, she keeps the lottery tickets for herself! :D

With March madness around the corner, I will find it hard to resist filling out a bracket! :)

no, that is called fraud.

those preachers didnt have much edumacaton?

LOL This one also said he didn't have room in his church for the homeless- his pews were gonna be full of expensive furs,and his parking lot full of fancy cars...he was tired of folk having the 'penny-cost' attitude...





...and you KNOW the rest of the story...LOL

Two words: Due Diligence. Do it and you probably won't get burned.

Outside of that: "There's a sucker born every minute!"

That would be accurate about day traders that get involved not knowing what they are doing and not understanding the market's auction process. It's like throwing darts blind-folded...for those that do know what they are doing, they are simply risk management experts and are not gambling...

Oh my goodness - what is going to happen to AFF if we all become legalistic?!!! But I gotta tell you, I'm in your camp on this one, bro!! You'll ALWAYS get my vote. And since I'm in Ohio, that vote will actually count!!

I live in Oklahoma and in my town alone there are more than 5 casinos. There is a little town a mile down the road that is literally falling to pieces. People have spent all of thier money at casinos and let their homes get run down--this county is the highest on foreclosures. It is a sad situation.

What really gets me is the deception of the casinos, who post billboards saying that they are creating jobs and revenues for our community.