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We already know you can’t stop yourself but we’ll keep the burden on you to stop because we’re making a lot of money at your expense
by Les
The concept of the “self-exclusion list” has always been a scheme for casinos and government to help deflect attention away from how they severely exploit addicted gamblers to reap their profits. Such lists allow them to say, like the Indiana Supreme Court did, there are precautions in place for addicted gamblers even though these precautions are purely superficial in reality. A court filing from Canada this week underscores this truth.
Clotilde Berube, a Canadian citizen who became addicted to the government-run casinos and lost her life savings, filed a $10-million lawsuit against Loto-Quebec. Berube says she was plied with booze and played the games in a drunken haze.
She then added her name to the self-exclusion list in which the gambler agrees to be banned for six months, a year or an indefinite period. The gambler is photographed. Breaches result in ejections or trespassing fines.
Berube says it didn’t take her long to breach the agreement. She says she went to Rideau Carleton five or six times, was not detected and blew another $10,000. She took the commission to small-claims court to try to recover her money. “If (self-exclusion) doesn’t work, then they shouldn’t have it,” says Berube.
Paul Pellizzari, the Ontario Lottery’s director of policy and social responsibility, says self-exclusion is a “voluntary self-help tool.” Breaches are the responsibility of the gambler.
Yet echoing the dissent of the Indiana Supreme Court justice, nowhere in Ontario’s statutory system of gambling regulation is there any provision that expressly or unmistakably abrogates Ontario’s common law requiring business operators to exercise reasonable care for the safety of their customers and subjecting them to accountability in damages for failing to do so.
We will follow her lawsuit as it progresses.
Laws need to be strengthened to protect ciitzens
The Indiana Supreme Court Justice hit the nail right on the head. Common law should already be enough to protect citizens.
Self-Exclusion
“Self-exclusion” is another flimsy public relations tactic that the casinos use to hide the fact that they can’t survive without gambling addicts. Studies in the US, Canada and New Zealand show that way over half of the casino profits come from problem and pathological gamblers. Addicts are casinos’ life blood. The fact that the states collude in this predatory Government-Gambling Industry Complex is shameful and a dereliction of duty on the part of our public officials.
As we are all discussing We already know you can’t stop yourself but we’ll keep the burden on you to stop because we’re making a lot of money at your expense | Stop Predatory Gambling, Would you believe it that people are earning millions of dollars daily selling information products online and offline? You too can tap into this business and create a job for yourself and others.
Slots [or pokies as we call them in Australia]
I agree that self exclusion methods are at the best only band aid solutions. Here in Australia where we have over 20% of the world’s slots you don’t need to go to the casino to gamble on the slots. As slots are just about in every pub [tavern/bar] and most clubs except in the state of Western Australia one is at the most 5 minutes drive away from these machines. In the CBD of Sydney there are at least 50 mini casinos [which the bars & clubs really are] with thousands of machines. Please see my blog in “slots and video poker machines” February 4th entry.