It seems to me that for most gambling addicts, the birth of the addiction comes fast and out of nowhere. That high from our first or second 'big' win (whatever the brain decides is 'big') where we walk out thinking 'How do people not know about this? This is fricking awesome!' is the moment we turn into a gambling addict. It's just that because we're not injecting or smoking, we don't think we've taken a drug.

But we have. Make no mistake. We have.

It's why so many people go back the very next day to 'do it again'. Our own behavior surprises us. We chase that high, but we SAY we're just having fun. Just doing a little gambling. "I'm bored and this is entertaining." "I could use the money." "I'm not hurting anyone." "It's my money & my life." "I've won before, I can do it again. It's just a matter of time." I've used all those statements. Or rather, they've used me.

I live in Canada. Here, all our provincial governments (and our federal) use gambling as a revenue stream. Who am I kidding? It's a revenue raging river. And they all advertise. They use pat slogans like, 'Know your limit. Play within it.' And they disgust me.

Why don't they just legally sell crack cocaine, using the slogan, "Know your limit. Smoke within it'?

Probably because they haven't figured out a way to do it that will fool us into thinking it's an adventure... yet. But with gambling, they don't care that's it's an addiction.

That's the bottom line. And I say, 'Fine, don't care. But stop advertising it like it's this incredibly fun, socially acceptable way to spend a weekend.' It isn't. I don't know if anyone reading this has seen similar commercials, but we have one that shows attractive people sitting around a poker table all celebrating someone's win - like Grandma finally came out of her coma. There's another one where women walk through a Casino with their hair shooting straight up into the air from all the excitement as people are winning big. (How's that for phallic?)

I've walked through a Casino. I've never seen a more desperate, anti-social place in my life. People aren't dressed up for a well deserved night out. Instead, I see hundreds upon hundreds of addicts and soon to be addicts. They don't look happy, they look like Zombies.

Don't get me wrong. They're all decent people. And many are there just checking things out (based on the commercials, maybe?) but you can spot the addicts a mile away. And there's more of them than people out for a fun night. They're the ones who place a 'Reserved' sign on 'their' machine as they go for a smoke or pee break. They're the ones that never look up or around except to check out if there's a better feeling machine near by, or to see who just won a jackpot. They're sitting at the roulette table or Blackjack table with 5 or 6 other people doing absolutely no socializing. They're the Zombies. I was that Zombie. I didn't go to Casinos often. My preferred back alley for drugs was at home, online, but I did occasionally go. Just to be sociable . so I'm telling you EXACTLY what I saw - at least what I saw walking in, before I became one of the Zombies in front of a machine.

I wish, by law, that the advertising had to show a real Casino floor at, say, 2pm. Show the sheer number of seniors on a fixed income, blowing more money. Maybe some shots of the faces of these folks 'having fun' as they leave the Casino broke. Follow one or two of them as they take out the money they swore they wouldn't touch from the ATM or as they head to the Payday Loan store. Or go home to an empty fridge (assuming they still have a home).

SHOW REAL GAMBLERS if you want to advertise, you bastards. Just like our government insists on putting disgusting 'real' pictures of smoking victims on our cigarette packages, their Casinos should all have a picture of a suicide plastered on their front door with the blurb 'Gambling is addictive and can lead to death.' After all they're our government and they claim to care. Why not? Oh, that's right. It's a revenue raging river.

It makes me angry. Can you tell?

Look, I know that a gambler is going to gamble come hell or high water. So a legally safe place to do it, isn't something I'm all that against. What I AM against, is their ENCOURAGING it with ridiculously false advertising. I don't even care, at this point, if they don't do anything to DISCOURAGE it, just don't advertise for new people to get suckered into a life of misery. Is that so unreasonable?

And maybe stop coming up with new lotteries. new scratch & wins. New ANYTHING. You've got more than enough 'product' already. What our governments are doing here in Canada is selling drugs. They just call them 'a chance to win'. There are people out there desperately trying to quit a brutal, life destroying addiction and their government is shelling out millions to make commercials that get in their faces, screaming, 'It's fun! Come on! Just know your limit!' I think that's criminal.

Sorry for the soapbox, but it fills me with rage sometimes to see such a lack of concern for people by an institution that's SUPPOSED to be FOR them. Instead, it just destroys them to get at what's in their pockets. Well, the bad news for the governments here, is that I took their advice to heart. I now know my limit and I intend to play within it for the rest of my life.

Today I will not gamble. Never again.