Online sports gambling has been illegal ever since legislation has passed on 2006, helping to regulate the Internet in a new and unprecedented way. People are still divided on the issue of Internet gambling. In 1961, the Interstate Wire Act prohibited phone-based sports gambling to take place, requiring illegal gamblers to do their business some other way. When the Internet became popular, it was wondered if the Wire Act applied there as well. It was a mystery whether or not the 1961 act related to the Internet, since it didn’t exist at the time. Whatever types of gambling the act was meant to prevent weren’t made specific in the act itself. Was just sports betting prohibited, or did it apply to every kind of gambling?
Only one thing was certain when it came to this topic after 2006 The government was going to pursue anyone that ran a gambling website until the day they shut down. The government wasn’t messing around when it came to this issue. They were going after the source of the issue, and as a result there would be no more problems with gambling on sports. All they had to do was target a few hundred website owners, and the millions of individuals that were gambling online would be forced to quit.
Sports gambling and its legality is a hot button issue right now. The opposition believes that games can be more easily fixed and rigged this way. Professional sports have a much lower likelihood for them to be fixed, as there are too many players and professionals involved to really be able to fix every game that’s put on. People who support sports betting cite it as something that adds to the entertainment value of the game, and it doesn’t do anyone any harm. Personally, I think that sports gambling is a bad idea that drains your finances quickly.
Many of the sports gamblers that I have known throughout my life started with small bets. Before too long, they run into a losing streak, and decide that that if they could just get one winning bet that they could win everything they lost, back. When you lose ten bets in a row, because it will happen, you can wind up losing a lot of money. Lets say the 1st bet you bet 100, 2nd bet: 200, 3rd bet: 300, 4th bet: 600, 7th bet: 4,800, 8th bet: 6,600, 9th bet: 19,200, 10th bet: 38,400. You can see how it adds up. By starting with a bet of $100 for the first bet, and trying to win back everything you have lost along the way for ten bets you’ve lost a total of $76,800. Now I know the thought that is running through your mind. What kind of person does this. Many people involved in sports gambling do it, I have even known some of the people who have done it. When you bet on sporting events you are betting with emotion, not your brain.
Recently, people have been discussing legalizing online gambling, as long as the government taxes the winnings, so that the government can make money. I sincerely hope this never comes to fruition, due to the damage it can do in a person’s life. Gambling can often be the downfall of many a family. If I were in charge, the issue of legalizing online gambling in American would never come up.
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