175
Legalizing Sports Gambling Was a Huge Mistake
(www.theatlantic.com)
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this post was submitted on 27 Sep 2024
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"Everyone person should have the right to make a bad deal for themselves" is the logic of the Lochner court decisions. They said the government shouldn't stop anyone who chooses to work in a hazardous workplace, or sign a contract that says you won't join a union or choose to put their 12 year old children to work in mines.
Our laws have to protect people, otherwise we're just doing libertarianism.
Our laws should protect people from doing harm to others. I couldn't care less if someone wants to smoke themselves to death. I care a lot if that person is near me blowing second-hand smoke at my face!
I think we have a fundamental disagreement with the way society should be. I want to protect people from predatory companies and won't elevate the individual rights of people to gamble over the welfare of all.
You don't care
Who said they want to control everything you do? We're talking about sports gambling
oh ok lets get rid of labor laws, since I signed a contract agreeing to the risk of harm for the money. It's all part of the voluntary exchange and I don't want no nanny state government telling me I can't sell myself into contract slavery! It's my body!
Talk about going to extremes.
I don't want a government telling me who I can marry, what bathroom I have to use, whether I can own a gun, whether I can drink or not, etc. You people aren't listening to what I'm saying. I was very clear that I want government to stop people from harming others.
You can keep missing the point and post about "muh voluntary contract" but that's not at all the same thing. Of course those should be outlawed... they cause harm to people. I want to get rid of Capitalism completely, but I'm not a fucking prude who is going into a UAW meeting telling people they can't blow $5 on DraftKings this Sunday.
Three minutes before this post you said that since people here disagree with you, you're going to kill yourself.
Please, first of all, if that wasn't an empty threat, don't do that over Hexbear.
But also please get some perspective here.
it's following your logic to its ends. If I have the right to drink myself to death then I also have the right to sell my body into slavery right?
Not all harm in our society is simple one-on-one "I swing my arm and strike your face" harm. We live in a complex social order where all actions taken interact with the broader world. There are a lot of behaviors that don't cause direct immediate harm to others but cause a degrading effect on society at large when enough people are doing it.
do you really truly believe this? would you say this about your parents or loved ones if they were smoking a pack a day and had emphysema and lung cancer? You wouldn't stage any kind of intervention to try and get them to quit and get them help? If they kept smoking, you wouldn't take their cigarettes away from them?
I extend the care that I feel towards my immediate loved ones to society at large. I am deeply saddened by deaths of despair, of millions of people killing themselves slowly with alcohol, tobacco and opiates. I don't think it's right to let them die without trying to help, just like I don't think it would be right to let someone you notice struggling to swim drown right next to you. We have obligations to love and help each other, and I would never let a loved one drink themselves to death if I could help it, so why would I let my fellow humanity do it just because I don't personally know them?
Libertarianism, individualism and voluntarism that you espouse completely ignores human interconnectivity and our obligations and duties. It pretends there is no obligation or duty to society.