Government and Gambling: Good or Bad?

The other day I was in my local corner store grinding my teeth as I waited for a lotto ticket person to have her tickets checked. As I heard the familiar, “WINNER – GAGNANT” I began to ponder the ethicality of government sponsored gambling.  

If the Ontario (Canada) government were a for-profit corporation it would have the best scam in town in when it comes to gambling. Not only does it run all the gaming but it’s also in the business of helping gambling addicts. This can’t be blamed on the current, inept, Liberal government, for all three parties have benefited from this set up when in power.

I tried to find the exact number of games the Ontario government runs but am not sure if I got all of them. Here’s what I did find:

·        The Ontario Lottery Gaming (OLG) Corporation has at least 25 scratch and win tickets available to the public.

·        The OLG runs a minimum 14 lotteries in the province.

·        There are 59 online games available (some experts would contend that online gaming is the most addictive).

So there are quite a lot of games for people to get into trouble playing. Many of us have heard the advice/slogan of the OLG – Play within your limit.  Telling a gambling addict this is like telling an alcoholic to only have one drink. It doesn’t work. All addictions have one thing in common: the inability for the addict to moderate and/or stop his addiction. The only way for an addict, gambling, drug or otherwise to begin to get better is to be abstinent from whatever he is addicted to. For the gambler this means no more gambling. Be it poker, scratch and win or a lottery.  Although, the jury is still out on whether a gambling addict can play Tim Hortons’ Roll up the Rim to Win.

Gambling has to be one of the worse addictions ever. I’m a recovered alcoholic/addict and will be forever grateful that I never became a gambling addict. If I were to relapse on drugs and/or alcohol I would have an immediate negative consequence. However, if a gambling addict relapses and wins she has a false positive. The disease will kick in and tell the addict that, “hey, you don’t have a problem you just won”. This can have devastating consequences. Of all addictions gambling has the highest suicide rate. The reason being that addict loses so much so fast.

It is this type of disease that the Ontario government via the OLG is helping to prosper. Don’t get me wrong I am not blaming the government, casinos, etc. for the problem gambler. That would be as if I blame liquor companies for my alcoholism. However, the liquor companies didn’t get me hooked then try to fix me. One of the jobs of a government is look out for its citizens’ welfare. The government is there to protect us from terrorists, criminals, health hazards and disease. Addiction is a disease. Gambling addiction is a disease of the mind. Researchers have proven that the areas of the brain stimulated by cocaine are exactly the same as the areas stimulated by gambling.  So if the government is providing the tools for gamblers to get addicted isn’t it going against its mandate of protecting its citizens?

The monies, made by government sponsored games, are put back into government coffers to help run the province. Very little, if any, is put into helping gambling addicts. The same could be said for the taxes raised by liquor sales – little, if any, are put into alcohol addiction programs. In fact, the government provides more money for harm reduction programs than abstinent based programs. As noted above the only true hope for an addict is abstinence from whatever he is addicted to.  So the question is: is it ethical for the government to be in the gambling business?

Here are some stats from https://www.problemgambling.ca/EN/Documents/FA_GamblingProblemGamblinginCanada.pdf

• 3.2% of Canadian adults are affected by moderate to severe problem gambling.

• 2.2% of youth aged 15–24 are affected by moderate risk or problem gambling.

Back to the story of me waiting for the lotto ticket person to have her tickets checked. It took a couple minutes for the machine to find all the winning tickets. Once this was done the winnings were given to the customer. The customer than began the slow process of buying more lottery tickets and picking out more scratch and win tickets. I usually wait patiently, yet annoyed, while this type of interaction takes place. And it DOES take place a lot. But this time it was going on 10 minutes and I finally lost it. I politely asked the sales person if I could make my purchase while the lotto person decided which tickets she wanted to scratch.

Next time you are in line behind one of these lotto people I would suggest you take a look at their clothes and shoes of said person. If they are spending loads of money on lotto tickets yet have holes in their shoes and clothes you are probably looking at an addict.

Dave the Dude

Can a Sociopath Benefit from a 12 Step Program?

In 2007 actor Kevin Costner starred in a movie entitled Mr. Brooks. The movie is about a serial killer who views his obsession to kill as similar to the obsession an alcoholic has to consume alcohol. In an attempt to stop murdering people Costner’s character, Mr. Brooks, joins Alcoholics Anonymous. Unfortunately, for both Mr. Brooks and another person, he relapses. Mr. Brooks is what some psychiatrists would call a sociopath or in terms of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV he has antisocial personality disorder. When hearing the term sociopath people immediately think of a serial killer. However, many sociopaths live amongst us without ever committing murder. In fact, they are very hard to spot. The 12 Step program of Alcoholics Anonymous is a cognitive-behavioural program with a spiritual component. The movie, and a book I recently read, has made me wonder if a psychopath can get better through use of the 12 Steps.

In author Martha Stout’s book the sociopath next door she states that four per cent of the population is a sociopath or four people out of 100. Ten per cent of the population is alcoholic so one has a greater chance of being a psychopath than an alcoholic. Stout explains a psychopath is someone without a conscience. He/she may understand right and wrong in an intellectual fashion but he/she does not care if they commit a wrong act – an act that would hurt another individual and/or animal.

There are some commonalities between a sociopath and an alcoholic. The first commonality being, the sociopath’s need to control everything. As a recovered alcoholic/addict I know that a big part of my addiction was fed through the delusion that I could control everything. If everyone in the world just did what I wanted them to do than I all would be well. As the basic text of Alcoholics Anonymous (AKA: The Big Book) puts it, the alcoholic wants to be the director and control the actors and lights, etc. on the stage of the world. The frustration caused by one’s lack of control is a big part of one’s need to drink. The Big Book states, “lack of power that was our dilemma”. The sociopath wants to exert control over everything around him. Another commonality between the sociopath and the alcoholic/addict is impulsiveness. The sociopath makes impulsive decision to fill his need for immediate gratification just as the alcoholic/addict does the same. The alcoholic/addict will eventually begin to break the law in an attempt to satiate his obsessive need to self-medicate. The sociopath begins to break the law to quench his need of control over others. While the alcoholic/addict feels guilt and shame over his actions the sociopath feels nothing as he has no emotions. This lack of emotion and/or conscience is why I believe the 12 Step program would not work for a sociopath.

Through working the 12 Steps I found out that part of the reason I drank and used was to push down the feelings of guilt and shame I got due to the actions I took to obtain alcohol and drugs and because of what I did while under the influence of alcohol and drugs. I would steal to get money for drugs, self-medicate, sober up and feel bad about stealing and my mind would tell me to get more drugs to rid myself of these bad feelings. This cycle of addiction continued until I was sick of living that way and faced my feelings head on. A sociopath does not feel bad when hurting another living creature and so there is nothing to face.

A 12 Step program required me to find a power greater than myself. This power could be anything I chose as long as it wasn’t myself or another human being. I balked at first at this requirement and then realized that alcohol and drugs were the catalyst to me doing things I would never thought myself capable of and therefore these manmade things had become a higher power to me With this realization it was easy for me to come to believe that there could be something greater than drugs and alcohol and therefore myself. I chose the power of positivity and people or as Dr. Carl Jung termed it the collective unconscious. A sociopath thinks she is at the top of the food chain and better than everyone and everything and therefore would not be able to find a power greater than her. Without the ability to find a power greater than oneself the sociopath lacks the ability to carry out a fundamental requirement in completing the 12 Steps. With the lack of a conscience and a high power the sociopath would not be able to carry out the amends part of the 12 Step program as well. If the sociopath did find himself making amends it would only be a gambit to fulfil a preconceived goal the sociopath has come up with.

As a result of the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous I was able to recover from the disease of addiction. But I feel if a sociopath tried to seek the same recovery through the Steps she would clearly fail. Even an alcoholic sociopath would fail.

Dave the Dude

Resentment is a Dish Best Served Cold

The basic text of Alcoholics Anonymous (1939) tells us that the number one killer of the alcoholic is resentment. It also suggests, and many members of the Fellowship concur, that praying for the person you have the resentment against is the way to get over it. In my experience this is easier said than done, unless you’re praying for that person to get hit by a bus.

When I did my Fourth Step I listed my resentments and then completed the inventory process. By the end I was over the resentments. One person I left off my first Fourth Step was my mother. She had passed away prior to my entering recovery and I felt that if I said I resented her it was speaking ill of the dead. A few years in I realized this was not the case and did a second Fourth in which I was able to deal with the resentment. I have repeated this process over the years for new resentments and have always been successful. That is until recently. \

Due to a series of events I ended up getting a huge resentment towards a few people. These resentments were much stronger resentments than I had ever had before. Part of the problem with getting over the resentments was that I was involved in a type of legal battle against those I had the resentment against. I had accepted my part in the incident and that helped, however, just when my resentments were starting to decrease I would get a call from my lawyer asking me questions and/or giving me an update on things causing the resentments to come back in a strong way. I quickly realized that as long as I was embroiled in this legal issue I wouldn’t be able to properly deal with the resentments.

After approximately four months the legal issue was complete. The resolution was not to my satisfaction but at least the whole thing was done. Without a constant reminder of the incident I was soon able to start the process of getting over these resentments. I’d like to say I’m completely over them but there is still some residue. I have stopped spending part of my day plotting revenge against the perpetrators. I still think they’re assholes but a wise man once told me that sometimes an asshole is just an asshole. I look to these people as spiritually sick individuals who couldn’t help but do what they did. Kind of like that scorpion who got the ride from that frog.

Dave the Dude

Idiots Guide to Speaking at an Open Meeting

There are more open speaker meetings than closed discussion meetings in my area. I love both types of meetings. For me open speaker meetings are a great place for fellowship and to hear a message of hope while closed discussion meetings are great places to share a problem and/or get down to the nitty gritty of the Steps and recovery.

I’ve heard some great speakers and some not-so-great speakers. I understand that people who share at the front of the rooms at 12 Step meetings are not professional speakers but I hear a lot of speakers who fail to transmit, in my humble opinion, what the Founders of Alcoholics Anonymous intended when they started the Fellowship. The basic text Alcoholics Anonymous advises us to share in a general way what happened, what it is was like and what it’s like today AKA our experience strength and hope. I hear too many people not following these simple directions. As a result I thought I’d provide my own guide to how a speaker meeting should be.

When it’s my turn to chair my home group’s speaker meeting it’s up to me to choose the speaker. This is a great responsibility. I am obligated to choose a speaker who will provide a good message to those who attend the meeting, especially the newcomers in attendance. In order to fulfil this commitment properly I have a few guidelines when choosing a speaker. The easiest way is to have already heard the person speak before. By choosing someone I’ve heard before I can be confident that they will provide a proper message of recovery. But if this was the only way people chose speakers than we’d never hear anyone new. To overcome this obstacle I will chose someone I have gotten to know either in person and/or have heard share numerous times at a closed discussion meeting. One can usually judge what kind of talk a person will give at an open meeting if one has already heard that person share on a smaller scale elsewhere. Once the speaker is asked and has accepted it is then up to them.

Now let’s go back to the suggestions on how to share – what happened (experience), what it was like (strength) and what it’s like today (hope) The first part of this equation should be brief but is essential to the talk in order for the newcomer to identify with. Far too often speakers make this part the longest portion of their talk which I believe is wrong. When I speak I will share examples of how the phenomenon of craving affected me and also how the obsession over alcohol/drugs ruled my life. I make this part simple and to the point. I then move on to the second part of what it was like (strength).  I firmly believe that this should be the longest part of one’s talk in an open meeting. This is the part where I share how I overcame my addiction and put the disease in remission. I explain how I worked each of the 12 Steps and the importance of them in my recovery. Finally I will come to the third part of my talk which is what it is like now (hope). Having, “had a personality change sufficient to bring about recovery from [addiction]” I am a recovered alcoholic/addict and share how my life is today. Just because I’m recovered doesn’t mean everything goes smoothly for me but I am now able to handle what life throws at me without having to self-medicate. Despite the bumps in the road I face I let those in attendance know that my life is far better than it was when I was active in my addiction and in so doing I attempt to give the newcomer some hope that they too can have a better life if they stick with and work the program.

My speaking skills, like my recovery, have evolved since I first entered the program on January 7, 2005. I try to be entertaining while fulfilling the task I have committed to. There was a time I focused more on making people laugh than sharing what I was supposed to and it never went well. I’ve also had more things happen to me then when I first spoke and if I feel they are important I share them as well. Sometimes something significant is going on in my life and I will include that. This helps me in my recover and may also help someone else who is facing similar challenges in their recovery. For me the best talks are those from the heart and because of this I never plan out what I’m going to say. I mean, I have some idea but nothing is written down and often what I thought I might say and what actually comes out of my mouth it totally different. During the moment of silence at the beginning of the meeting I will ask my Higher Power to work through me to help the still suffering alcoholic. This is what has worked best for me and I hope you can take my suggestions to heart.

Dave the Dude

DID I HEAR THAT RIGHT?

In my humble opinion humour is essential to recovery. If one can’t have fun in recovery then what’s the point of staying clean and sober? When I decided to give up the high cost of low living I had no idea what recovery would entail. I figured that Alcoholics Anonymous was just a place where a bunch of people sat around a table and commiserated about how rotten life was since they couldn’t get wasted anymore. Thank God I was wrong because if that was the reality I wouldn’t have stayed long. Leaving my first meeting I had some hope that life could get better and would be enjoyable. One must always remember Rule 62 of Alcoholics Anonymous – don’t take yourself so seriously. Keeping this mind here is my list of things you don’t want to hear at a 12 Step meeting.

1)      When the speaker opens with, “I’m not a long speaker”, beware. I have fell for this line many the time. In over a decade of experience I have learned that when the speaker says this line you are in for one hell of a long talk. That would okay if the talk was good but inevitably it is long and boring. Which leads me to the next thing you don’t want to hear at a meeting…

2)      When the speaker opens with, “I’m not one for drunkalogs”, you are not only in for a long talk but one with little reference to actual recovery. Usually these talks are indeed a drunkalog and focus on drunken exploits of the speaker.

3)      When it comes to Alcoholics Anonymous and its singleness of purpose you will often hear  a speaker say, “I respect AA’s singleness of purpose but drugs are a part of my story and I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t talk about them.” To me a statement like this is equivalent to someone saying, “don’t take offense but you are an asshole.” Just because the person told me not to take offense doesn’t mean they’re let off the hook for calling me an asshole. The same goes for the saying you respect the singleness of purpose but go on and discuss drug use anyway. I was a carpet crawling, whisky swilling, alcoholic/addict but when I speak at a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous I use the term “outside issues” when referring to my drug use. At the most I’ll refer to a white powder I snorted that helped me drink more. There’s nothing in the Traditions that says I can’t share my experience with drug use on an individual basis and that’s what I do in Alcoholics Anonymous.

4)      One thing that drives me crazy occurs at discussion meetings. At many meetings right before they close the chairperson will ask, “is there anyone here with a burning desire to share before we close?” To me this means that if someone is in trouble and needs to get something off their chance or they risk drinking/using then please speak now. What usually happens is that some guy who loves the sound of his own voice (who has already shared during the meeting) will put up his hand and talk just to get a last word in.

5)      Often times you’ll hear the advice, “don’t drink and go to meetings”. Not drinking and meetings are great but if you don’t actually do the 12 Step Program as laid out in the basic text of Alcoholics Anonymous you have a great chance of becoming a dry drunk and/or relapsing.

6)      Often in 12 Steps meetings (in all Fellowships) you will hear that relapse is part of recovery. There’s two ways to take that. If when saying this one means that relapse begins as soon as a person, in recovery, begins to have stinking thinking and stops his spiritual maintenance then, yes, relapse is part of recovery and one has to learn how to become aware when this happens to stop it before it leads to a drink or drug. However, often times when someone says this they mean it’s okay if one takes that drink or drug because it was inevitable. Well, I call bullshit on that. That type of relapse is not part of recovery. If one thinks that is true then one is setting himself up for failure by keeping a back door open in one’s mind to go back out.

Some other things that people often share drive me batty. I don’t need to be lectured to (just share your experience). When someone tells me how to pray that is not helpful. I can’t count the number of times that someone has stood at the front of a room and told people that if they don’t pray on their knees then they will not stay sober. I don’t pray on my knees. My Higher Power lifted me up off my knees so I’m not going back down on them. Once in a while you will hear a speaker chastise the audience about not giving enough money during the Seventh Tradition. The Tenth Step Axiom states that when I don’t like something about someone else it’s usually because I see something in that person I don’t like about myself. So don’t put your guilt over not giving to the Seventh on to me. People who lecture on this don’t know the financial situation of those in the audience. “There are no dues or fees” – that should always be remembered.

These are just a few of the things I often hear at 12 Step meetings that I take with a grain of salt.

Dave the Dude