I have something I need to vent about, that I've tried to vent to friends about as well, but where nobody has been on the same page as me before.

In short, I despise gambling (casinos, sports betting, loot boxes in games, etc.), I think it destroys lives, often slowly and discreetly, and I think advertisements for it should be as taboo as tobacco advertisements and should even be illegal.

In long:

I've seen a trend in the last few years of sports betting becoming advertised to an unbearable degree. I can't watch any sport without a commercial for draft kings or fan duel. I can't even watch youtube without content creators being sponsored by draft kings. Advertisements for sports betting, specifically, are literally everywhere. I'm even in a basketball chat and there are several people there that DON'T EVEN WATCH BASKETBALL, they're specifically there to talk about the bets they make for a sport they don't watch.

I've seen at least a dozen friends sign up due to the ridiculous amount of advertising and with almost every single one, they claim they're getting "free money" since DK does give you free bets on a first deposit or something, but then every single one, after running out of the "free money" doesn't cash out and delete their account, they put five more dollars in, then put ten in, etc. until it starts to control their life and their finances. There shouldn't be a person alive that doesn't know how gambling can destroy you, but people still sign up for this bullshit. Nobody seems to understand that the only reason draft kings can give you free money on signup is because, on average, they make MORE than that per person.

On the subject of casinos, I went to Las Vegas for the first time last year. I already knew how elaborate and rich the casinos on the strip are, that part did not surprise me. What did surprise me is that if you go just a few blocks off the strip, it's almost entirely run down low income housing. You have possibly one of the richest areas in the United States in the form of the strip and seemingly none of that wealth is being shared to neighboring communities. It just goes back into the strip, getting sports teams to move to Vegas, getting F1 races, etc.

It just baffles me that so many people gamble and, even when warned about it, even after losing money, they insist that it's fun or that it's not so bad, but I truly think that gambling culture and companies running gambling schemes are some of the biggest evils out there. My parents divorced partly because of gambling. My dad permanently fucked his life up because of it. He has zero money, is now at an age and health where he can barely work, and my sister and I will likely be stuck footing the bill for his care later in life when just 15 years ago he was in a position to be set up pretty well for the rest of his life.

And yet, people still go to Vegas and lose hundreds or thousands on slots or cards, people still sign up on draft kings and lose hundreds or thousands on bets, and seemingly everyone I talk to is entirely blind on how bad of a situation this is and thinks me radical when I say that gambling advertisements should be illegal.

I value personal freedom, I don't think gambling should be banned, but I do think it can pose just as much of a danger to ruining someone's life as cigarettes can, but as a society, nobody seems to have any issue with ads for sports betting and casinos.

In addition to all of the above, we still have loot boxes in video games and collectible card games as a whole, but that would be another 2 pages of writing and I don't want to get in that deep.

If you stuck with me this whole time, thank you. I don't expect many people to agree, but I at least really needed to vent this out, even if it's into the void.

Do any of you have positive or negative experiences regarding gambling to add?

Just wondering how many average 10 year olds you think you can fight off before being overwhelmed. Here are the basic terms of fighting: the kids are very angry at you, each one will fight you until they get hurt enough to quit or become unconscious, you are unarmed, and you are in a gated school playground as the battle arena. The playground is about 50 feet around, closed gate around in an octagon and closes up top like a dome. First one kid comes at you, then it adds one each time you defeat a group. Defeat 1 and 2 come, defeat the 2 then 3 come, and so on. Each group arrives by sliding down a pole into the middle playground and sliding down the slide. From there, they rush at you full force.

I feel confident in my abilities to fight. I'm pretty sure I can get to group 13, so that would be roughly give or take 70 kids if I can take a few out in that round.

What do you think?

"You haven't found your sport, yet."

That's it. That's the thing I wish someone… anyone, my friends, my parents, some stranger on the internet… had told me a long time ago.

I was not a very physically active kid. I wasn't fat, but did have above average BMI, didn't enjoy PE, didn't get picked in the football teams, the works. I grew up with this notion that I was just One Of Those People who Don't Like Sports. A complete lie.

My dad was into Rugby, so he put me to Rugby practice as an 8 year old. I was very good at it, mostly because of sheer force (I was really strong and bulky for my age), but I did not enjoy it. The other kids were gross and annoying, it wasn't fun. So a couple years later, I stopped, and my father told me: "Pick another sport."

It's a significant question, one you don't have the true answer to when you're a kid. I picked Fencing, though. I kinda liked it? As much as one can like a physical activity when you're "One Of Those People who Don't Like Sports", right? It was different, original. It wasn't particularly fun, but could I really expect to ever have fun doing physical exercise? After all, I hated going to the gym, and I didn't enjoy running, so surely, I'm just not that into sports.

So that was it. I thought I had found it, the one I happened to pick at the age of 12, after not much soul searching at all. I did it for a few years, picked it back up at 22 for a few more. I tolerated it. Loved my club and coach in one of the cities, something which fooled me into believing I was a fencer. I'm 30 now, and until the age of 27, I had zero doubts about that. I had the gear and years of experience. I would move somewhere new, look for a new fencing club, get demotivated because it's a 40 minute bike ride to get there, and just… not go.

In retrospect, it's obvious that I didn't particularly like fencing, any more than most people like ironing their clothes. Of all the things I'd tell Past Self, I would start with just how motivated I would be only a year later. I would tell them about the subscriptions to 4 different ice rinks across the country, the train subscription with the 1 hour commute to get there, how I'd go 4 days a week and feel sad when it's only 3, and how I'd always be taking my gear with me whenever I go to another country as trying out a new rink would be the most exciting part of an international trip.

I'd tell past self:

"You haven't found your sport, yet. It's just that you don't like the ones you tried. You're still thinking about motivation, but this is about necessity. When you find it, you will fall in love. It will become a core part of your life and identity. It will bring you joy and be your partner, like the piano to the pianist. You found a sport you can tolerate… one day, you'll find one that is truly You.

Keep looking."