2003 Soap Box Archives

Where Does It Stop? 10/03/03

A Mr. David Williams of Indiana is suing a gambling casino for letting
him lose money to them. Can you believe it? I wonder if Mr. Williams
thought that the casinos were in business to let people win? How does
he think they keep the doors open? Why would they keep building more
and more of them? Who twisted his arm and made him put his money down?

I’ll admit that it’s a crying shame that Mr. Williams lost what was
most likely his life’s savings but to blame it on the casino?

This is just another example of people simply not accepting
responsibility for their own actions.

Should we make the liquor stores responsible for problem drinking, the
fast food shops responsible for obesity, society liable for nervous
breakdowns? Can we sue the sun for causing skin cancer?

I’m certainly not taking the side of the gaming industry but just
because they exist is no reason for someone to blame them for their
losses. If you go into a casino and stay there long enough you’re
going to lose.

I know they show you the pictures of the people who won a million
dollars on one pull of a slot machine handle, but where do you think
that million dollars came from?

Out of the pockets of other suckers, that’s where it came from.
I hear the term “compulsive gambler” and I have no doubt that these
people exist. But I don’t believe that everybody who loses money on a
blackjack table is a compulsive gambler.

If someone is a compulsive gambler they are going to lose their money
whether in a fancy casino or a back alley crap game and they need help.

When are we going to wake up to the fact that each person has been
given free choice to choose what they want to do? Why is it so hard to
realize that the blame belongs to the individual?

After all, that’s what America is all about, freedom to speak, to
express our opinions, to use our lives for productive reasons or to
throw it away on drugs. To use our money to make a better life for our
families or to waste it in casinos.

You can’t beat a casino. Very rarely will you ever walk out of a
casino winning. They aren’t designed for that. They could never stay
in business if everybody won.

When you walk into a gaming establishment you may as well look at it as
you would going to a ball game or a movie. It’s entertainment and
you’re going to have to pay for it.

There are casinos springing up all over the U.S.A. now and it never
ceases to amaze me how they continue to flourish and anyone who is
foolish enough to think that they pay thousands of employees and keep
those millions of bright lights burning by letting people win should
have their head examined.

What it boils down to is this. Never walk into a gambling casino and
bet money you can’t afford to lose, because the odds are you’re going
to do just that.

Pray for our troops.

What do you think?

God Bless America

Charlie Daniels

 

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