If you’re watching any sports on TV, you’re now bombarded with gambling site ads. No matter what province you’re in, most of them are for Ontario residents only. You’ll see the tiny print on the bottom stating “you must be physically present in the province.” But every province does have sites and then there are always the online and unregulated ones.
As of last month, Ontario has banned the use of sports personalities, athletes or other celebrities in these ads. I may be cynical, but politicians and governments are the last people that care about doing anything positive. Yet even THEY are realizing these gambling ads have gotten way out of control. Studies show it’s 20% of sports ads, maybe that’s low because curling doesn’t have a lot of them, but it feels to me like it’s more than half of all ads these days…at least for NHL games. And they’re everywhere: Go to any minor hockey arena and you’ll the the boards plastered with gambling ads. Just like tobacco: It’s never to early to plant the seeds. After all, that’s their future customers! Want proof? Ask any six to 10 year old that watches hockey if they’ve ever wanted to bet on the games. You’d be stunned by the results!
Gambling is super addictive. Should we even allow these sites to advertise at all? We no longer allow ads for tobacco. No, the health care costs for gambling addicts isn’t nearly as high as tobacco became. But is there a difference? Setting aside that odds are better on slot machines than sports gambling, should we encourage and promote this? Not to mention the sucker bets and tiny odds of winning in-game bets. Even after the first period, if your team is down by two goals you can still bet! The odds now get massively high which is a great incentive (trap) to still bet your favourite team. Never mind the stats that frequently show up on the top left of the screen: X team is 26-3 when leading after one period…or whatever the stat. Yup, bet your team coming back 26 times and you MAY win three out of those 26 bets! There’s optimism and then there’s stupidity…