To be quite worried about this, DH says I'm overreacting

[Problemorno]

Hi all. I'm a fairly regular poster but have name changed for this.

So DH has always enjoyed the odd bet or gamble but has never bet more than £5 a week or so. Just recently he received an offer of free spins on one of the slots websites and took it. He deposited £10 and won £20 so put another £10 on. And so on.

Now a month later he has bet around £200 on slots games. He's been very very lucky and won around £600 in that time so technically he hasn't lost any money. Yet. But I keep telling him eventually his luck will run out and he should stop the betting while he's ahead and before he gets hooked. But currently he is still betting around £10 a day, at least that's what he tells me. He has shown me his online banking and it seems to check out.

I should say that he is only betting his own money that's left after bills, not family money (we have a joint account that we put our wages into and that all the bills, food money etc comes out of, and he hasn't touched any of that. We then split whatever is left over and that is our 'fun' money). But I'm terrified it will eventually spiral. After all, didn't most problem gamblers start off like this? He tells me I am catastrophising, it's his money to do what he wants with, he'll stop when he starts losing money and he's only bet so much because he's won so much etc.

Is he right? Am I overreacting? I've heard so many horror stories of lives ruined by gambling addiction. We have two young DC. I don't want to tell him what to do with his own money and have always said that as long as the bills are paid and we have some savings (which we do and they haven't been touched either), he can do what he wants with it. But I'm worried he will spiral. I've always been a saver and financially cautious so maybe that's why I'm leery?

YANBU - You are right to be worried
YABU - You're overreacting

"But gambling is a total waste of money. It’s a complete waste. Because you have nothing to show for an increasing expenditure."

This statement obviously false. Someone could buy 5 lottery tickets, win big and then never spend any money again, or at least, never spend enough money during the rest of their life on lottery tickets to eclipse the amount they won.

That's why you need to think rigorously. Otherwise your arguments can be blown away in seconds by people that do.

I say again, value is subjective, not objective. You are not the arbiter of value. Stuff isn't worth more or less to me based on your say so.

Except in order to do that, they have to be willing to take the risk that they’ll lose the money - ie the risk is worth the loss. And the number of people who buy five lottery tickets (ever) and win so big they never have to contemplate spend again is so unlikely that we can confidently claim it doesn’t happen.

Ha !

I've long come to terms with my lottery ticket purchases, even if they make no mathematical sense in odds terms ! I value the fun of imaging what will happen if I win big too much which compensates me for the appalling odds !

I certainly wouldn't let anyone else tell me that I can't purchase them :)

I protest more because I see a lot of negative thinking about gambling when I would prefer people to see what it for what it is and understand that just because they don't value something doesn't mean others think in the same way.

But you didn't say that.

You said :

"But gambling is a total waste of money. It’s a complete waste. Because you have nothing to show for an increasing expenditure."

At which point I demonstrated pretty much instantly a situation where it isn't.

You didn't say anything about probabilities/likelyhoods. You just said that it was a total waste. End of story.

In fact the ROI (return on investment) is only a minor part of the value I get from purchasing my lottery ticket, because I also value the experience of imaging what would happen if I won.

People can decide that they have the power to judge whether something is worthless or not on behalf of the entire world. They just shouldn't be surprised when the rest of the world rocks up and says that they're wrong.

YANBAU. Gambling is seductive and many fall into addiction without meaning to. It’s making you unhappy and uneasy , so if he isn’t addicted why can’t he just stop ? His willingness to carry on despite your unhappiness would be a red flag 🚩

No, it’s still a waste of money - because you have to be willing to waste it to spend it.

Why is that different from any experience ?

If I go to the cinema there is the chance that the experience will be rubbish and the film will be bad. I have to be willing to buy the ticket and see the film to find out.

Does that mean all cinema visits are a "total waste of money" ?

Honestly your arguments make no sense.

It’s different because you paid a fixed price and you saw a film ie you got what you paid for.

What do you get from your average gamble?

I don't think you can compare a weekly lottery ticket (which raises money for good causes apart from anything else) to visiting a slots game website. Those things are invested in directly targeting your pleasure centres to fleece you out of as much money as they can and have been very carefully designed to do so. Unless you are extremely self disciplined any joy out of them is the hollow satisfaction compulsive behaviour does give you, when you come out of a pleasure trance and realise that it's 1am and the kids are still up and you've been matching brightly coloured candy for 5 hours, or you've just eaten a packet of biscuits and feel fucking terrible. Not your friend at all.

My uncle put £2000 in a William Hill account. He bet on racing for 25+ years. He always maintained that any other hobby, be it match tickets, bikes, guitars etc. would cost far more than the expenditure on his particular hobby.
He recently died (aged 84) and had £1080 in his William Hill account.
He never became addicted and £1000 over 25 years was not a huge amount. If DH can afford to lose his stake, it need not be a problem.

At the moment, he is spending roughly £300/month on a hobby.

Is that a lot of money in your household or a little? Do you spend a similar amount on a hobby each month?

His hobby might escalate. It might become an addiction.

He probably thinks that this is not a £300/month hobby. Because he thinks he might/will make money. He won't. The £300 loss is guaranteed, but he might lose more.

You are married, so his financial irresponsibility could land you in trouble. If he wants to keep gambling, you should immediately lock away money from him. Do not put your earnings where he can get them. Do you own a home together? Is he on the deeds?

There is no more certain outcome than there is if I buy a lottery ticket. I paid a fixed price for that and I got what I paid for, a chance of winning rather than paying a fixed price and getting a chance of whether I would see a good film or not.

From my average gamble the end point is sometimes I win, sometimes I lose, but I always have the experience of imagining what would have happened if I had won, and the excitement of going through that process of finding out.

I attach value to that experience.

So we're getting into the discussion that some gambling is deemed OK because it is more "morally righteous" than other gambling ?

For example old Gran going down the bingo hall of an evening is OK, but Susan playing poker with her mates isn't ?

That's a debate all in itself ...

But you could still have that imaginary experience without wasting money on the ticket.

It's not about moral rectitude. It's about the likelihood of ruining yourself and your family for something that amounts to nothing.

That's thousands a year. Hell no

So you are suggesting I can win £50 or £125 million without buying a ticket ?

You're suggesting I don't buy a ticket and I just write some numbers down on a pad, check them off when the results come in and it will give me the same experience ?

Clearly not because in one scenario I have the chance of winning and the experience of that process, no matter how small.

And in the other I would have absolutely zero chance. Which is different.

People clearly value that experience, otherwise they wouldn't buy tickets and check the numbers.

You might have noticed that there isn't much take up for the zero prize lottery, where it's free to enter, you make up your numbers, and then you win precisely nothing, no matter what the outcome.

No, you’re saying you’re paying for the experience of imagining what you would do if you win the lottery. I’m saying you could do that regardless.

Or is the pull the potential to win, no matter how much money you waste in the process?

The potential to win is certainly important, and if you look at the psychology of people who do it that is a significant factor, irrespective of the odds.

Most people generally don't care that much about the magnitude of the chance of winning, but it's important that they have at least a chance otherwise they wouldn't play.

People are willing to pay the price of the ticket to have that chance and the experience of going through the process of finding out whether they have won.

People don't judge the money as wasted, they pay for the experience of potentially winning big and the process of finding out whether they have won, which is quite exciting. For me anyway.

No, it’s not just you - that’s why people gamble. That’s why it’s so risky.

You are not being unreasonable, OP. This would really scare me too. The difficulty with online gambling is how insidious it can be. The apps are designed to be addictive, the games are designed to be addictive, we tend to always have our phones with us so it can be accessed anywhere 24/7 and although these things don't guarantee a problem, they definitely make a problem developing more likely. It would be very rash of your DH to not at least acknowledge that the aim of these games is to create a desire to keep playing and the risks that come with that. It isn't about judging how he spends his money, it is just about making sure he is aware of the potential hazards of participation. Particularly at the moment when money is on everyone's mind more than ever, the lure of "winning big" must be very potent!
I really hope everything works out for you both and that your DH can find a way to have fun safely in a way that works for both of you. X

So we're moving on from "it's a complete waste of money" to it being "risky" now are we ?

Well for me those are separate discussions.

As regards it "being a complete waste of money" my belief is clear. It's simply an experience that some people value and some don't (subjective). Enough people in the world appear to value it as an experience to make anyone insisting it is valueless objectively wrong.

As regards it being "risky" I suppose it depends on what you term as "risky". Subjective again.

Some people seem to manage it OK. Others don't. I wouldn't for example label it as potentially ruinous as heroin addiction, where it seems almost impossible to do it to any degree without becoming seriously addicted. But it certainly can lead to negative behaviour in some people, and in extreme cases financial ruin.

There are a lot of people who gamble irresponsibly, drink irresponsibly, eat irresponsibly, do plenty of other things irresponsibly.

There are also a lot of other people who gamble responsibly and can limit themselves. My guess is that for every person who gambles ruinously there are a hundred that gamble that don't. In fact gambling in many forms is incredibly prevalent in society. Probably pretty similar stats to alcohol.

Would I term that "risky" ? I don't know - I would have to think about it. If I was in a relationship with someone who exhibited negative behaviour as a result of gambling then it's definitely something that I would want to be aware of and discuss with them - but I think I have already said that.

I certainly wouldn't make an a priori assumption that just because someone was gambling then that was automatically going to turn itself into destructive behaviour. I think I would want to stay aware of it though. But that would apply to pretty much anything my partner was doing that I thought might have an impact on our relationship.

My xh used to gamble a lot - he used to be up on his wins but would never disclose a loss, for the exact reason of not wanting to admit to himself or me that it was a money pit and he was addicted. He was also a drinker, he’s got an addictive personality. ironically the gambling wasn’t the worst of it but it was something that escalates, starts with a harmless flutter and turns into money you are scared to talk about. He used to use “my money” when he’d pissed his (quite literally) up the wall.

this is also why he’s my xh.

No, it’s still a complete waste of money.

There’s a podcast called ‘Life Changing’. There’s an episode about someone with a gambling addiction. Too lazy to link