They hated him, for he spoke the truth

MacN'Cheezus@lemmy.today to Lemmy Shitpost@lemmy.world – 548 points –
28

Attend a gamblers anonymous meeting and you’ll meet a lot of people who have lost more than 100%

That’s because they were gambling with other people’s money.

If you only bet with what you can afford to lose, that’s never going to happen.

Woof that slope is slippery. The trick is measuring what you can afford, and a lot of people aren't great at measuring that.

See if I only bet 90% of every paycheck I still have 10% left over for lottery tickets

If I lose the 90%, I just gotta win the lottery..

Except when you short stock, there could be infinite losses. Or perhaps with a contract for difference too

I only like playing with futures. It's a problem for my future me and 0 problems to current me.

I strongly think that OP is trolling ITT, but if someone seriously thinks this is an argument for gambling, I recommend checking out some introductory stochastics concepts, starting with expectation values

Theoretically you can lose more than 100%. If you first win 2000% and then lose everything, you’ve technically lost 2100% of your starting capital.

Yes but you still only lost 100% of what you wagered.

The mind of a gambling addict is a sick sick mind. I'd like to think that if I came out 2000% richer, I would hold and walk away and be happy with that.

but gambling addicts come up with all these rationalizations like you mentioned. rationalizations that make them keep gambling No matter how much they've won or lost and they are never satisfied.

You miss all of the shots you don't take

- St Gretzky, Patron saint of sports gambling

Leg breaking was invented to handle the idiots who were in to their bookies for way more than 100%.

That's only if the gambling place doesn't rig the games...by the way, every gambling place has a business model that depends on their customers losing all their money.

Licensed casinos aren’t allowed to do that, that’s why they like to comp gamblers their drinks, including alcohol, instead. Makes people stay longer, lose their inhibition, and increases the chance that if they do win, they’ll keep playing until it’s all gone again.

Licensed casinos aren’t allowed to do that,

They aren't allowed to do a lot of the things their profits depend on.