A little bit about the
Neuroliberation campaign
The Neuroliberation campaign originally
started in 2011 (under a different name) after its founder Benjamin Thacker
suffered a gambling addiction which started in 2009.
Ben was lucky (or not so lucky) to win £500
playing roulette on the fixed odds betting terminals at a Ladbrokes betting
shop in Brighton. He started playing
with less than £5 and quickly found himself up to £500 in less than two hours.
This happened on a rainy evening in 2009.
Ben was homeless at the time and had walked inside Ladbrokes to keep out of the
rain. He intended to spend only a short amount of time inside the betting shop
until he had dried-off but instead found himself continuously winning on the
fixed odds betting terminals until he was up to £500 and the shop was due to
close.
This immediately led to a very serious
addiction to the fixed odds betting terminals and he found himself spending
many hours in betting shops on a daily basis.
Aside from having his own problems through
his addiction, what shocked him the most was how much he saw that the exact
same problem was happening to a lot of other people.
Addictions to fixed odds betting terminals
are becoming a big problem within the UK.
Various media reports have dubbed them the ‘crack cocaine’ of gambling.
A big part of the problem which is
currently being reported in the media is that betting shops do not need to
apply for planning permission. Since a change in the law (Gambling act 2005) betting
shops have opened in clusters, dominating town centres and high streets.
William hill alone has at least 2,350
betting shops in the UK. Only the Post Office has more retail premises on the
UK high street.
Ladbrokes has over 2,100 betting shops in
the UK.
The big players in the gambling industry
such as William Hill and Ladbrokes claim in their written submissions to the
government that there are an ‘insignificant proportion’ of problem gamblers in
the UK. This is not the case however as
a new style of social culture in betting shops is starting to manifest.
Both Ladbrokes and William Hill (they aren’t
the only ones) claim that they are successful in protecting children and the vulnerable
from problem gambling. This too is a false claim as betting shop staff on a
daily basis witness people losing hundreds, sometimes thousands of pounds in a
matter of minutes.
They have also started to advertise posters
that are very appealing to young children, cartoons etc.
A lot more young people (and also women)
are becoming problem gamblers now since the concentration of betting shops, the
introduction of fixed odds betting terminals and the change of law in regard to
advertising.
Before the gambling act 2005, betting shops
were by law forbidden to advertise on the outside of their shop or place
sandwich-boards in the street. Like any
other major corporate industry, the gambling industry has its eyes set on
expansion and long term investment and the real facts about the current problem
with fixed odds betting terminals and gambling addictions in the UK are being
swept under the carpet.
A major factor as to why the gambling
industry is permitted to launch an all-out assault on the British public so
easily is because several MP’S in government involved with the gambling act have
many close ties with the gambling industry. For instance MP Steve Donoghue is
an adviser to the department of culture, media and sport but also has ties with
Ladbrokes, various racecourses and he is also a gambling industry consultant.
Many MP’s involved with the gambling act have
received £1,000’s worth of hospitality from the gambling industry as well as receiving
a membership badge for the national racecourse association in 2003.
Most
of the research done in the UK on problem gambling is one way or another
gambling industry-sponsored.
In 2010 research conducted by a review of
gambling law review committee found that the only public money being spent on
researching problem gambling in the UK that year was a program funded by the
NHS for £25,000. After just a couple of months the NHS decided to abandon the
project.
However, there are some MP’s that are trying to raise awareness of the
current problem with betting shops and fixed odds betting terminals, including
MP for Tottenham David Lammy and MP for Peckham Rowenna Davis.
Since 2005 a lot has changed in regards to media
advertising for the gambling industry. As a nation we have now found ourselves
in the position where quite often not thirty minutes pass us by without a bingo
or casino advert appearing on our internet pages and television screens.
As well as petitioning to the government
and raising awareness publicly about the problem with the concentration of
betting shops, another aim of the campaign is to provide information to problem
gamblers that might not have otherwise come across this information.
Like many addictions, the brain chemical
Dopamine has a very important part to play in problem gambling.
What is so dangerous about playing roulette
on fixed odds betting terminals is that anyone that has a surprising win on
them can very quickly become addicted.
It doesn’t matter how strong minded a
person thinks they are, they are still only human. When somebody experiences a surprising
win playing roulette they will experience a deep setting association with
pleasurable dopaminergic brain activity and gambling.
As dopamine acts as a natural ‘driver’ for
us to do things in everyday life that bring us fulfilment and reward (i.e. Work,
cook, exercise) a person with a gambling addiction in most cases will fall
victim to cognitive rewiring. (see http://neuroliberation.blogspot.co.uk/p/the-hidden-dangers-of-gambling.html
for more information)
Excessive distribution of dopamine to the
brain has been linked with schizophrenia and cognitive impairments with
symptoms similar to ADHD and Bi-polar disorder.
Whilst betting shops with fixed odds
betting terminals are taking over our high streets and town centres, public
funding for the very people who will go onto suffer from the individual and
social effects of gambling is being cut.
The effects of letting the gambling industry
continue to operate and advertise in which the way they currently do, whilst
sugar-coating statistics, could potentially cause depression within communities
that could last generations.
Please join the Neuroliberation campaign to
say enough is enough, we want positive places in our communities, not places that
blight the soul of an area and create even more social problems.
