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BGonline.org Forums
How many pro BG players?
Posted By: Robert Wachtel In Response To: How many pro BG players? (Phil Simborg)
Date: Saturday, 16 March 2013, at 1:59 p.m.
Well said, Phil!
It's a pleasure to find someone on this forum who is not struggling with self-loathing and shame because he has made a few dollars betting on some backgammon games. Too many of us have internalized the irrational Puritanism with which society brands "gambling."
To clarify some points I may not have expressed adequately in other posts:
(1) Some of us have an especially guilty conscience (or, as Nietzche would have said, a weak stomach) about the possibility that we may have taken advantage of others' "addictions." But addictive behavior, if that is a useful term, exists all around us in varying degrees, and is the engine that powers a number of the enormous industries I listed in a previous post. Were those industries not able to pander to people's strong, and sometimes obsessive desires (through psychologically astute advertising, intensive scientific research and the production of ever more attractive and effective products), they would lose most of their viability. No mere backgammon player should lose sleep over the fact that he may have panned a few flecks of gold from the mighty river of profit that they have channeled.
(2) Instead of looking at ourselves, when we are successful, as freeloading low-lifes, why not regard ourselves as mental athletes, playing a very demanding sport? Do we think that Tiger Woods should feel awful about all of the millions he has taken from the pockets of lesser golfers?
In answering the above question, take a moment to think about the fact that, because golf is a very popular game, it has huge sponsors. All of its tournaments, that is, have lots of added money. It seems, therefore, that your average professional golfer is doing something different from your average professional backgammon player, who has to win his money from his peers. But there is no difference in principle, or ethically, between the two. The golfer is just luckier (or more clever) to have chosen to participate in a more popular sport.
(3) There is no ethical difference between betting with someone heads-up, in a chouette, in a tournament, or absolutely anonymously, as occurs when one makes an on-line sports bet. If you win, the money has to come from other people. The emotional reaction that some of us have when we are confronted with others' anger or grief upon losing is akin to the reaction that your average meat-eater would have if he had to slaughter his own dinner. It's fine to remove yourself from that experience, but don't kid yourself into thinking that your food appears magically on the supermarket shelf.
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