Casinos are for Losers
by Gilbert Oskaboose

I believe the time has come for me to quit gambling. Its getting out of hand. I just dropped $5,000 bucks at the casino in Sault Ste. Marie with not a damn thing to show for it. Enough is enough.

I believe like most other Indians I am prone to habitual behaviors and self-destructive patterns. Ive been "lucky" so far. Got hung up on the abuse of food and cigarettes but never went the alcohol route. Thank the Creator for small mercies. I think alcohol and gambling are the same in that you reach a point when you dont know when to quit...just one more drink...just one more hundred bucks out of the ATM machine.

It appeared to be fun at times, bagged $4,500 bucks out of the slots in Rama once. Won two or three thousand here and there on blackjack and the slots now and then. But in the long run the losing has been greater than the winning. Gambling is a losers game, and thats why the casinos are filthy rich and the rest of us are not. Its as simple or as complex as you want to make it..

Might have worked if I could have kept it a social event or learned to set and abide by strict limits, but I couldnt. I always think that its the next pull of the reels that will hit the jackpot and that never comes. A fine madness takes over and you just dont quit till your money is all gone. Ive come home with my tail tucked between my legs just once to often. Its all over, finished. No more.

As well I think all casinos are crooked anyway. The one in the American Sault has been warned by the :independent" agency that allegedly governs it to loosen up its slots enough that people can win a little or face closure. I cant prove it but I think that all casinos including the ones online are crooked as a three dollar bill.. They all claim to have completely randomized machines and claim to be strictly governed by highly reputable financial organizations but I think thats pure lies and rubbish.

There is just no way that those machines can be completely "randomized" and yet continuously crank out losing combinations. If they were truly random then logic says you would win now and then. And you do win now and then and its that "little" that keeps bringing you back to inevitably lose a lot. Big deal, so it gives you a cherry and six measly points for every hundred dollars you put into the damn thing. Most casinos have a top real prize of $1000 to $1500 dollars despite all the hype about the thousands and millions available for you to win. Most casinos have their machines wired up so tight you would need nothing short of a large sledgehammer to get anything out of them.

And dont bother writing in to tell me about the guy in RubberBoot, Saskatchewan who won 7 million on the slots. There is always someone out there who bagged the big one. And yes, I know that if you dont play, you never have a chance of winning anything. Thats all a part of the carrot that the casinos are dangling in front of your nose - to keep you donating even more money to them.

Casinos are not the new buffalo in Indian Country. They are not our salvation, our redemption, our way out of poverty and squalor. They are a guidepost on the road to Hell and an open inviting door to things far worse than weve ever dreamed of. Take my word for it. Casinos are all a part of the Whitemans bad medicine.