Gambling

[SMP]

I submitted this question a while ago to the 100 Hour Board, but it has not been answered yet. Just as well, I think this forum is probably a more suitable location anyway, so I am posting it here now.

This is a response to question Board Question #61288 as well as previous questions that are linked to in that question.

I am still not convinced as to the reason that the church, and conservative Christians generally, are so opposed to gambling. And I also find some of the arguments that differentiate investing in stocks from gambling to be rather weak.

For example, suppose I go and spend a day at a casino, and spend most of the time playing blackjack. Assuming I am not counting cards, but just following common sense rules, I will win a little bit less than half time, and will likely lose money during the day. If I play long enough, the amount I lose overall will pretty much be statistically predetermined amount, which the actual amount will not diverge much from that.

Another scenario. On a given saturday, I place bets on 10 different football games. I watch several of those games, and keep track of the others, and it is much more exciting to me because now I am personally invested in these games. Chances are, I will win about half of these bets, and will likely come out losing some money over all because of the fees the bookkeepers charge.

The common argument against gambling is something along the lines that gambling produces nothing of value. But that's not true. If I enjoy playing blackjack, or I enjoy watching football, and having some money on the line increases the excitement, then there is something of value. It is the enjoyment.

One could argue that going to an arcade, or to an expensive restaurant, or going to a BYU football game, all provide nothing of real value. Are we really any better off after doing these things? But there is value. The value is the pleasure we derive from it.

Another argument against gambling is that it is addictive and destroys lives. But I think that is an over-generalization. Not everyone who engages in gambling is going to get addicted, and have their lives ruin. In fact, I would venture that the vast majority of gamblers live perfectly normal, healthy lives. The fact that some people are addicted and engage in destructive behavior is hardly reason to condemn some activity. Should we also broadly condemn video games? I know a lot more people whose lives have been negatively affected by video game addiction compared to gambling.

So I guess my question is, what is the flaw in my argument? Or, is it possible to disagree with the orthodox talking points on this matter, and still be a faithful member of this church without guilt?

Another slightly different question:

The explanation for why playing the stock market does not constitute gambling seems to come down to the fact that when you buy a stock, you become part owner of the company, and the company has value. I will concede that point. My question concerns options trading. I am not a financial expert by any stretch of the imagination, but it seems to me that when you purchase an option, you are doing little more than betting that a certain stock will increase in value by a given date. I quote the answer given by Yellow on question Board Question #43366:

On the other hand, an investment in the stock market has a residual value. Even if your $10,000 investment in Acme, Inc. drops to be worth only $15, the fact remains that it still has some value and it could yet regain value. There's no "do or die" date in your investment; it retains some value as long as the company exists. And lest you claim that the dissolution of Acme, Inc. is a "do or die" moment just like any other investment, let me point out that the date of dissolution is not known when the stock is bought. There is no predetermined condition through which on Y date, you either win or lose. When the investment is made, you have a reasonable expectation that your investment will always retain some value. You've gained something real for your money.


With options, there is a do or die moment at which point your investment becomes worthless. So would buying options be considered gambling, and thus expressly forbidden by the Church?

[Tao]

In my opinion, the flaw of gambling is not centered on the spending/losing money, rather on winning. The expectation of something from nothing goes contrary to the "by the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread". The gospel is based on hope, gambling is based on false hopes, pretty easy to see what the origin of gambling is (cf Moroni 7).

I'm no expert on stocks, but I do know some things about starting up a small business and the capital needed therefor. To sink money into such a venture is a gamble in every sense of the word, yet as I understand it isn't something frowned upon, as the intent of the money is to build, and such growth is ostensibly serving the greater market at some point.

To put it in another frame: my expenses currently run ~$300/mo. If I were to somehow convince you and your friends to send me $10 a day so that I could sit and do nothing, not only would no growth occur, but regression would be sure to. I'd become lazy, indolent, and entitled; not qualities that benefit me nor my fellow man. If, in return for that $10 per diam I gave some form of entertainment, say some wacky written answers on student-submitted questions, would I then be violating the principles of God? Not as assuredly as in the first example, but most likely. While I'd be getting some growth out of my labors of writing, and you'd be getting some entertainment, I'd be guilty of price-gouging and overcharging even if you were willing to pay such a cost. The laborer is worthy of his hire, yes, but so too is he commanded to give an honest days labor for such hire. Now say that I was unable to reach the minimum standards of living on my own/with the support of my family, and you offered $10 a day as charity. The obligation then is on me to be doing all that is in my power to utilized such charity to gain the education or growth needed to become self-sufficient and one day be able to empathetically offer charity in kind.

Such a balance is hard to find, and harder to set limits against, so the church forbids gambling and sets up charities that provide true growth potential, leaving the principles taught and the governing to the individuals.

[Tao]

Also, to say that many don't get addicted isn't a very good argument against avoidance. Not every drink leads to alcoholism, not every hit of extacy is fatal, nor does every trip to a strip club lead to immorality. We are promised that we cannot fall without sufficient warning, and the strength of such warning is often tied to the steepness of the cliff. That being said, any extreme in gaming is actually advised against, whether it be spending days on World of warcraft, or wasting hours in front of Farmville. ("When entertainment turns from virtue to vice, it becomes a destroyer of the consecrated life." D. Todd Christofferson Oct. 2010)

Yes, I believe you can spend the twenty bucks you set aside for the week's entertainment at the blackjack tables every now and again and suffer no real ill-effects. Then again, the ramifications of such a habit on those around you may be more detrimental than we'd like to admit. (Avoiding the appearance of evil/image sent to your kids, the casino buys one more add that happens to catch a recovering addict at a moment of weakness... etc.)

[ahem.]

You ask where the flaw in your argument is, and I agree with Tao that it is in your assumptions about why the Church is anti-gambling.

The common argument against gambling is something along the lines that gambling produces nothing of value.

Another argument against gambling is that it is addictive and destroys lives.

While these are interesting points, I think it comes down to understanding the principle draw of gambling. I posit that the major reason people gamble is that there is a chance you might get a lot of something for practically nothing. Which is contrary to the principles of hard work and diligence which the church embraces.

So, anyway.

I know people who get lottery tickets in their Christmas stocking, or throw a few quarters in a slot machine when they pass through the Vegas airport. I think this is keeping it on a simple 'just for fun' level that I have no problem with, but would probably never do myself.

So if you want to bet on a football game with your friends in order to feel "invested," or play a weekly poker game or whatever... I guess I don't really care. I don't think it makes you a bad person. But when you start involving larger sums of money, I would be careful to make sure you're not crossing a line you'll later regret.

[thebigcheese]

I just looked up the famous gambling talk by President Hinckley, given in 2005. You can read it here.

These are his main points:
1) It can become addictive.
2) You start to believe that you can get something for nothing, which is a fallacy.
3) By its very nature, gambling is not fair. Since the house needs to make a profit, most players are going to lose. The games are designed with that intent.
4) It is generally associated with other forms of immorality--it can draw you into the wrong crowd, so to speak.
5) There are better ways to spend your time.

I think the second and third points are the most significant ones. Since the "something for nothing" point has already been addressed, I'll try to tackle the other one.

By its very nature, gambling is not fair. Games vary in size--perhaps only a few players, or perhaps a few million. But they all have one thing in common: everyone pays, but only one guy wins. It's the biggest crock in the world, and it's one of the easiest ways to take a group of people and make them all a bunch of suckers. In a casino, the games are designed for you to lose. State lotteries are designed for you to lose. Bets are designed for you to lose. It's all about making a fool out of the other person. You thought you could win? HA! Guess again.

People ALWAYS overestimate their chances with these things. Casinos and lotteries make their money off of this. So, they basically take advantage of people who are too foolish to know better. There is certainly something immoral about that.

Now, it is tempting to think that gambling is only problematic for the losers. However, I would suggest that the winner has a problem too--he has just profited from the foolishness of others. He just took advantage of his buddies! When you look at it that way, would you feel good about depositing that check in your bank account? Some people would undoubtedly answer that with an enthusiastic YES, but they are generally not the most moral-minded of people.

So, to sum up, the Church does not encourage its members to be suckers, nor to take advantage of others.

[Waldorf and Sauron]

SMP, if you're the one who asked the earlier questions on the board, I recommend the book "Against The Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk." It's pretty mind-blowing. I don't want to write my own review, so here's Amazon's, which gives a good description:

With the stock market breaking records almost daily, leaving longtime market analysts shaking their heads and revising their forecasts, a study of the concept of risk seems quite timely. Peter Bernstein has written a comprehensive history of man's efforts to understand risk and probability, beginning with early gamblers in ancient Greece, continuing through the 17th-century French mathematicians Pascal and Fermat and up to modern chaos theory. Along the way he demonstrates that understanding risk underlies everything from game theory to bridge-building to winemaking.
http://www.amazon.com/Against-Gods-Rema ... 0471295639

[Laser Jock]

People ALWAYS overestimate their chances with these things. Casinos and lotteries make their money off of this. So, they basically take advantage of people who are too foolish to know better.

This reminds me of a quote I've heard in various forms. "The lottery: a tax on people who flunked math." (attributed to Monique Lloyd)

There's enough truth in that that it's both funny and a little sad.

[Tao]

The OP does have a point that gambling isn't restricted to starry-eyed hopefuls ignorant of the odds.

For example, suppose I go and spend a day at a casino, and spend most of the time playing blackjack. Assuming I am not counting cards, but just following common sense rules, I will win a little bit less than half time, and will likely lose money during the day. If I play long enough, the amount I lose overall will pretty much be statistically predetermined amount, which the actual amount will not diverge much from that.

While I think that the amount lost does follow trends, to assume the actual amount doesn't vary may be taking in assumptions beyond simple statistics. Nonetheless those who understand the bell curve of returns is skewed left can still enjoy gambling with the thought that the price they are paying is covering their steak dinner and the entertainment for the night.

Also something to take into consideration is the emotional factor. As I've pointed out before in these threads; people who are talking about subjects they feel strongly about often believe themselves to be logical when thinking primarily with their emotions. Risk-taking is tied pretty strongly to some of the most primitive parts of the brain, I'd guess that very few have the ability to remain entirely logical while gambling.

I know that I don't; and I'm not sure how I feel about that.

[thebigcheese]

The common argument against gambling is something along the lines that gambling produces nothing of value. But that's not true. If I enjoy playing blackjack, or I enjoy watching football, and having some money on the line increases the excitement, then there is something of value. It is the enjoyment.

One could argue that going to an arcade, or to an expensive restaurant, or going to a BYU football game, all provide nothing of real value. Are we really any better off after doing these things? But there is value. The value is the pleasure we derive from it.

In moral terms, I don't think you can use pleasure as a valid argument. After all, aren't most sins pleasurable to some extent?

[wired]

The common argument against gambling is something along the lines that gambling produces nothing of value. But that's not true. If I enjoy playing blackjack, or I enjoy watching football, and having some money on the line increases the excitement, then there is something of value. It is the enjoyment.

One could argue that going to an arcade, or to an expensive restaurant, or going to a BYU football game, all provide nothing of real value. Are we really any better off after doing these things? But there is value. The value is the pleasure we derive from it.

In moral terms, I don't think you can use pleasure as a valid argument. After all, aren't most sins pleasurable to some extent?

Not that I'm jumping on board with SMP, but I think werf's contention is that the "no value" argument is the sole or primary argument against value. Thus, if it does actually produce value - in this case entertainment value - then that argument isn't relevant and there are no other (good) arguments against gambling.

I concur with the opinion that the primary issue is getting something for nothing. Elder F. Burton Howard, somewhere on speeches.byu.edu, said he makes a point of it not to enter drawings of any sort so he avoids winning. (I don't espouse this view, just showing the underlying logic on it.)

I think the more interesting question between Blackjack and avoiding all games is what counts as gambling versus shear entertainment. For instance, what are people's feelings on the following situations:

-You go golfing with a friend and, "in order to make things more interesting," you decided to put $10 on your round. You are both aware of each others' skill level.
-You go golfing with a group of six, some of whom you know, some of whom you don't know. Every decides to put in $10 and the winner takes it all.
-You decided to enter a golf tournament that requires a $10 entry fee. Winner takes all.
-You decide to enter a Texas Hold 'Em tournament that requires a $10 entry fee with every player allotted the same amount of chips. Winner takes all.

This incredibly Pharasaic and irrelevant (I don't golf and I don't enter poker tournaments), but as far as philosophy of gambling goes, I think it's interesting to think about.

[thebigcheese]

Not that I'm jumping on board with SMP, but I think werf's contention is that the "no value" argument is the sole or primary argument against value. Thus, if it does actually produce value - in this case entertainment value - then that argument isn't relevant and there are no other (good) arguments against gambling.

I agree that the "gambling produces nothing of value" argument is incomplete without further explanation. I think it is much more accurate to argue that gambling produces "less value" than other, more worthwhile activities. Especially in the grander scheme of things.

I'm just saying that the fact that something has "entertainment value" is completely unrelated to its morality, so you can't argue in favor of something solely on the basis of its entertainment value (since that argument has zero credibility in religious matters). Many entertaining things are considered immoral. For example, going to a strip club can certainly be entertaining, but that certainly doesn't make it an appropriate activity for Church members to participate in.

[thebigcheese]

The Church does not encourage its members to be suckers, nor to take advantage of others.

Here are some quotes from Elder Oaks, to back up my previous statement. While I agree that the "something for nothing" argument is one of the most significant points, I really think this is on par with it:

What does gambling do to its participants? The attitude of taking something from someone else in order to enhance our own position—the essence of gambling—leads us away from the giving path of Christ and toward the taking path of the adversary. The act of taking or trying to take something from someone else without giving value in return is destructive of spiritual sensitivities.

All are encouraged to ignore the reality that the winner has been enriched at the expense of a multitude of losers. In lotteries, fewer than 1 in 1,000 wins anything. What of the effect on 999 losers?

A related technique of the adversary is to get people to focus so intently on the desirability of ends that they ignore the morality of means. Screwtape and his helpers could undercut the moral base of an entire society if they could just persuade citizens, bit by bit, to ignore or justify immoral means on the basis that the ends are good.

Again, I argue that just because gambling increases the intensity or the fun of a football game, it doesn't justify the fact that you've just scored fifty bucks at your buddy's expense. Your personal gain, at the expense of other people, is not morally justified.

[ahem.]

And I also find some of the arguments that differentiate investing in stocks from gambling to be rather weak.

Did anyone want to address this point further?

[thebigcheese]

A lot of it depends on your intent. For example, most people invest in diversified portfolios because they are statistically very likely to gain money over the long run. Some people buy individual stocks because they want to have ownership rights--they want to have some sway in how the company operates. But there are other people (day traders) who buy and sell stocks with basically the intent to gamble. They just hope and hope and hope that it will go up, so they can sell it off for a pretty penny. So, investing in stocks doesn't necessarily have to be a gamble, but you can certainly make it one.

Here's a little anecdote from my husband (who is a licensed broker):

One thing to think about, with regards to stocks and gambling: what kinds of personality traits does this activity bring out in you? Today, he took a call from a day trader who was absolutely furious. When the guy called in to buy a stock, he had to wait about 10 minutes to be connected. During that time, the value of the stock had changed just a little bit, and he was furious. This guy had become so personally invested in this one stock that it suddenly mattered more to him than anything else in the entire world. It certainly mattered more than common courtesies like being cordial to his broker. When an activity starts to negatively affect the way you treat other people, or how you view other people, you might want to rethink whether you ought to be participating in that activity.

[UnluckyStuntman]

When an activity starts to negatively affect the way you treat other people, or how you view other people, you might want to rethink whether you ought to be participating in that activity.

By this logic, there is nothing inherently wrong with the activity of gambling, but rather with a person's reaction to it. If I can play poker or slots casually (as in not become consumed by it), then does that make gambling okay for me but wrong for someone else?

[Dragon Lady]

When an activity starts to negatively affect the way you treat other people, or how you view other people, you might want to rethink whether you ought to be participating in that activity.

By this logic, there is nothing inherently wrong with the activity of gambling, but rather with a person's reaction to it. If I can play poker or slots casually (as in not become consumed by it), then does that make gambling okay for me but wrong for someone else?

I don't think he's saying that's the only standard by which to hold an activity, but it is one. I think that standard is true for any activity at all—addictive or not. If playing basketball makes you treat everyone cruelly, maybe you should take a break from it until you can figure out how to change your attitude. If trading stocks makes you treat other people cruelly, maybe you should rethink your participation thereof.

[Marduk]

DL, Thebigcheese is female.

On topic: I'd like to make the point that not all investment activities are worthwhile, or even moral. While one may believe in the value of investing as a form of allowing capital to be pooled in order to build something that otherwise would not have happened, one may question the value if this something were a strip club, for example. In the same way, I think those who consider themselves moral ought to consider just what they are investing in, and the manner in which they are investing. Time to introduce some caveats which will almost certainly get me into trouble: I think options can be immoral. I think interest-only loans are immoral (and stupid.) I think banks which disguise the value of assets (think mortage bundles) to be immoral, and one ought not to invest in them. I think credit card companies are the very definition of usury and are immoral, and I would no sooner invest in one than in a liquor store or strip club.

Many of these have much more to do with gambling than I think most members would want to recognize.

[Dragon Lady]

DL, Thebigcheese is female.

Yes, but I was talking about her husband, which you can't really see in that specific quote. But if you read her original post, the anecdote was from her husband, who, I believe, is a "he".

[Marduk]

Oh, I read her comment differently. The anecdote I realized was from her husband, but I thought the commentary on it was hers.

[thebigcheese]

Heh. Not that it matters, but DL is correct in her interpretation. The commentary was his as well. Sorry for the confusion