Originally posted on 06/17/2013:

I agree with Xenophon about the pokies.
They are a scourge on our society.
Instead of people spending money on themselves or their families, they go and piss it away in a pub/rsl/casino/club on the pokies.
More should be done to curb their dominance over people - similar to what the government has done with plain packaging for cigarettes.
Make machines dull and boring, no noises, no fancy colours, no fancy free spin features - that should at least cull some users.

But sports betting?
C'mon people, that's taking it to the extreme.
At least with sports betting, the outcome is based on actual events that can go any way.
All pokies are programmed to only return 87%-93% of what is put into a machine.
You can increase your chances of winning in sports betting by studying form, past results, teams, and a whole range of variables, but do you increase your chances of winning on pokies by playing them more and more?