Trials of ‘cashless gaming cards’ are currently taking place at selected pubs and clubs in New South Wales as part of an evidence-based approach to tackling problem gambling in this state.
Supporters of these cards are optimistic that they will assist gamblers to curb their spending, but as yet the results are inconclusive.
Not only is gambling forbidden by Islam, but it can devastate lives every bit as much if not more than most other sins and vices.
The urge to gamble often remains with former gamblers long after they are confident that they have shaken off the habit.
I personally know of people who have managed to rid themselves of the ‘gambling bug’ but still get urges many years later to try their luck, one more time.
One particularly destructive form of gambling is poker machines which can send normally sensible people into an almost hypnotic frenzy as they feed their cash into the slots of the ‘pokies’ at their favourite licensed premises.
Lured by the bright, flashing lights and the very slim chance of that elusive jackpot (according to gambleaware.nsw.gov.au, your prospects of winning a $5,000 jackpot on a $1.00 poker machine in NSW are almost 10 million to one) but completely oblivious to time and their rapidly dwindling bank balance.
Poker machines don’t discriminate.
They greedily accept all ‘donations’ – it doesn’t matter if you’re an apprentice tradie ‘blowing’ your pay while drinking alcohol at the local pub with your mates or a pensioner sitting alone and sipping on a lemonade at a licensed club, whilst secretively squandering your meagre fortnightly Centrelink pension payment.
In these and many other millions of instances in Australia every year, the licensed establishments housing these evil machines will gleefully accept your money – and you don’t even have to be a member!
The pub owner or club manager just sits back smiling – and keeps banking your money as your life goes down the drain.
As most of you reading this article are Muslims, gambling may not be something that you have ever been exposed to at close quarters. Alhamdulillah.
But it is definitely a problem in some areas where Muslims reside in large numbers.
For example in 2021, poker machine losses in the Canterbury-Bankstown region were a disturbing $562 million, more than any other Local Government Area (LGA) in NSW.
And when you consider that (also in 2021) almost a quarter of the residents of Canterbury-Bankstown were Muslims, it certainly suggests that in spite of gambling being haram, that there has to be some crossover.
Just finally on Canterbury-Bankstown.
The average poker machine in a hotel or club in this LGA now records over $250,000 a year in losses. That’s around $5,000 a week and a scary statistic to say the least.
You want to hear scary? According to wesleymission.org.au, NSW poker machine losses have totalled $135 billion in the last 30 years and what’s more, there are around 100,000 pokies in NSW, which is 30 percent more than in Victoria and Queensland combined.
Make no mistake. Poker machine gambling is vile and it is insidious.
Yet licensed clubs are still permitted to run radio advertisements bragging about their supposed charitable exploits!
Even though these donations (which are probably a tax deduction anyway) aren’t a drop in the bucket compared to the gambling revenue that licensed venues bank each and every year.
Making themselves out to be the ‘good guys’ when they are actually profiting from people’s misery.
It begs the question: If cigarette advertising was barred from the media in the mid-1970’s, why almost 50 years later are licensed clubs still permitted to promote themselves on the radio under the pretence that they assist charities, when any donations they do make are in all likelihood from the proceeds of poker machine and other gambling?
Yes – smoking is a health hazard but every bit as much, gambling is a wealth hazard!
It also takes the gambler away from his or her remembrance of Allah, resulting in negligence of their duties towards the Almighty (for example skipping prayers, neglecting the family, not donating to charity etc).
In the Holy Qur’an, Allah describes gambling as “an abomination of Shaitan’s handiwork”.
May Allah grant us the ability to act upon His commandments and to abstain from His prohibitions. Ameen.
If gambling is causing problems in your life, call GambleAware on 1800 858 858 for free, confidential advice.
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