Sports Betting Is Just The Tip Of The Iceberg

 The number of sports betting commercials seen on tv would have been unthinkable when I was a kid, or when I was in my 20 or 30s or more, or 10 and perhaps 5 years ago. And what we should note about sports betting is that those who participate in it are only interested in what they can win. Their betting shows little concern for the welfare of the players involved.

Of course some sports betting is nothing more than a kind of social interaction and is the result of comradery. In such cases, the emphasis is on the social relationship and friendship than on winning money. But outside of that, sports betting not only can cause deep personal problems for some, it acts as a sign of the times. Indeed, what Martin Luther King Jr. said about some investors certainly applies to those who are addicted to betting or count on a significant amount of winnings from their betting (click here for the source):

A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation, it will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries, and say: "This is not just."

Of course if sports betting was the only kind of betting that illustrated the self-centeredness about which King spoke, it might not be worth mentioning here. But there is a bigger casino to target here. That casino is the Stock Market. So while sports betting is the tip of the ice berg, the Stock Market is what lies underneath the top of the water and threatens ships that pass by.

We should note that unless one buys originally issued shares, a business never sees the money involved in a stock transaction even though a stock price might positively affect the financial future of a business. Rather, when buying shares from someone else, the seller is the only one who receives money from the sale of stocks. And while many people have some sort of financial adviser who is acting in their behalf in the purchase of stocks, the same motivation of buying solely to increase one's own profits is in play. There is little to no concern by those who own stocks in contributing to the welfare of a business and its employees outside of the ROI those workers produce. And for many, if not most, publicly owned businesses, the purpose of those businesses is to maximize the ROI for its investors. And so such a motivation can turn shareholders into the stock market equivalent absentee landlords.

And so what we see with most shareholders, not including activist shareholders who have some other priorities, is the same kind of motivation that Martin Luther King Jr. spoke against in the above quote.  And lest one thinks that my ranting here is out of an ideological opposition to the Stock Market, one only needs to talk to enough employees of publicly owned companies to confirm what is being said here. Publicly owned businesses exist primarily for their shareholders and the job of those executives who represent the shareholders is to maximize the ROI of those shareholders regardless whether it is at the expense of the businesses' other stakeholders.

We should note that such a mentality is not lost on those becoming adults. Having read some of Dr. Anthony Bradley's twitter account I see his deep concern for the lostness of young men in this country. And, IMO, why shouldn't they feel lost when our society and economic system teaches us that work is counted as being less important than wealth and that our culture is telling us that when looking for jobs and careers, we are to look solely for what we can get out of a job or career rather than including what we can contribute to people. In fact, the consumer society that we have been living in for at least a couple of generations now has taught us that same lesson. That our significance is found in what we can get and consume rather including what we can contribute and give to others.

So it isn't just our latest spike in sports betting that is passing on this same message, basically it is the same message that our economic system is teaching us. And the spike in sports betting is telling us how much the message is sinking into the minds of many of us.

Our demise as a species will be caused by our refusal to share power and wealth. And at this time in America, we have too many messages from multiple sources telling us telling us not share our wealth, not to seek the betterment of others. It is certainly ok to invest in order to get a return.  But when the only motivation for investing is to maximize our ROI with little to no interest in the betterment of those who are affected by our investment, we see a system that will eventually cause its own demise as well as our own.

What We Need From The New Democrats In Congress

Most of the time, reducing an issue to one subject is counterproductive. It really doesn't help us to understand most issues. That is because most of today's issues are complex that involve many parts.

For example, before the last Presidential election, a friend told me that what needs to be fixed in our nation is the economy. My friend believed that once we fix the economy, most if not all of our other major problems could be easily fixed. And in one sense, the economy is doing better under Trump. Then again, the economy was also improving during the latter part of Obama's tenure. However, the cost of Trump's contribution to improving the economy puts the future of the environment at greater risk than before, continues to increase wealth disparity, and has caused the National deficit to spike which could be used as a justification for future cuts to entitlements.

However, there is an important job that the newly elected  Democratic Representatives must tackle before they try to accomplish anything else: they must change the culture of the government and the nation. Will that eradicate all of our problems? No. But changing the culture is a prerequisite affecting real change in our nation.

What is the current culture about? It is about the maximizing of one's wealth. And we don't just see that maxim followed in the corporate world. If we look at free agency in professional sports, players who are free agents are expected to negotiate in order to get the most money they can from whatever team they choose to sign with. And while we should be somewhat tolerant of those who belong to the lower economic classes who try to maximize their earnings in order to survive, players who are paid tens of millions or even millions of dollars per year don't need to maximize their own profits. When players, many of whom we are taught to regard as heroes, do that, more and more people are inspired to follow their examples.

What is wrong with the ethic of maximizing one's profits? The problem lies in the fact that such an ethic is a cannibalizing ethic in that it devours all other sets of values. Those who consistently believe in maximizing their own profits must logically disregard any laws that reduce their profits. If they are logically consistent, they will break laws so long as the violation of those laws and getting caught produces higher profits than not breaking those laws. Thus, all other ethics and values exist at the pleasure of the maximization of profits and that is why we can describe the maximization of profits as a cannibalizing ethic. .

No doubt we see the maximization of profits ethic as being the predominant ethic of the business world. And since those newly elected Democrats do not participate in the sector of the business world, there is not much that the newly elected Democrats can do change the culture there. But they will be participating in the writing and passing of government legislation and that is where these new representatives can make their first impact.

How can they do that? They can do that not only in what legislation they write or vote on, they can do that by holding their colleagues, especially fellow Democrats, accountable when they favor legislation in order to fill their own pockets. These new Democrats must not only vote the convictions they campaigned on, they must push their colleagues to let their votes be determined by morals and values rather than by dollars and favors.

Here we should note that we basically have 2 major secular sources of values built into American society. Those sources consist of our Democracy and our Free Market. Those sources, for the most part, produce disjoint sets of values. While the former source promotes a certain degree of egalitarianism, the latter promotes privilege earned by successfully competing with others. While the former should provide a number of unconditional benefits, the latter earns privileges. Those who seek to maximize their profits are also seeking to maximize the privileges that come with more wealth.

What is interesting to consider is to guess which of those 2 secular sources of values are more important to us. It is very easy to answer that. When values from Democracy are more important to us, then those values have a growing effect on how the Free Market operates. The result is that we become more willing to share power in and wealth from the workplace with those in lower positions. When values from the Free Market become more important to us than values from Democracy, then competing to conquer the political landscape to rule over others becomes more important to us. And when making deals with private sector elites in order to defeat one's opponents becomes paramount, then it is clear that values from the Free Market are more important to us. This desire to conquer results not just in an ever increasing reluctance to share political power with those from other political parties, ideologies, and fellow citizens, it soothes any disturbed consciences of those who feel guilty about making our Democracy all about competition.

Our Democracy is not just about winning the majority, that is what our democratic processes revolve around. Democracy is also a state of being for society where how society is shared is vital. Democracy occurs when society is equally shared with others. It is about having self-restraint so that even when one has the political power to rule over others, one doesn't because one sees society as belonging equally to one's opponents.  And here we should note that those who are most vulnerable to not having an equal belonging to society are those who are marginalized in society. They have included non-whites, females, and the LGBT community.

So the newly elected Democrats have a substantial challenge to meet. The question becomes whether they can even recognize the real challenge that faces them let alone meet that challenge.