As I See It...

A weekly commentary
by James E. Felton

January 27, 1997

I generally consider myself a religious person though as an adult I've never found it necessary to affiliate myself with any particular religious denomination. As a child I was raised attending a Methodist Church. I sang (solos sometimes) in the choir, and regularly participated in the Church's youth activities. Our Church was in our neighborhood (as was our school), which was a new suburban development. So there were alot of young families with young children in both our neighborhood, and our Church. As a result our Church was very involved in youth activities. Through my teen years it kept me pretty busy, and was often alot of fun.

For those who aren't familiar with the Methodist Church I would describe our Church as a very liberal environment. Questions were always welcome, and there was never any pressure to "be saved", or "baptized", or anything like that. You were never made to feel that you were a bad person, or told that you might burn in hell. And the sermons often covered very interesting, and controversial topics, including such things as sex, and masturbation. Seriously! The emphasis was always on the positive (i.e. how to help make the world a better place). People who attended our Church were made to feel comfortable, and welcome (though subjects such as those mentioned above might make some people less than comfortable!).

So, what has this got to do with casino's, and logic you ask? Well, bear with me. I'm getting there.

The "open" policy of our Church encouraged its members to question things, and this led me to question the whole issue of the various "denominations" of Churches. This led me to attend other Churches to try to understand the differences. Over a period of several years I attended various other Churches, and became somewhat familiar with their doctrines. Many of them varied greatly from our Methodist Church. And many made me very uncomfortable!

In this process I encountered a Church that I found to be, in many ways, similar to ours. What made it similar was the fact that it encouraged openness, and thoughtful questioning. It was/is called a charismatic Church. For those who aren't familiar, many charismatic Churches teach that God wants you to profit. Therefore, many charismatics are very involved with what they believe are divinely inspired powers that can be used to help you profit. For example, some charismatic Churches strongly emphasize specific aspects of Christian teaching such as the belief that if you give you will receive ten times what you have given. Non-charismatics (and non-Christians) often refer to this same principle, perhaps without realizing it, when they say something like, "what goes around, comes around".

This particular Church also taught another christian principle which they called "seeds of equivalent blessing". The way seeds of equivalent blessing works is that when someone "does you wrong", rather than retaliate you plant seeds of equivalent blessing. In other words you absorb the wrong that was done to you, and convert it by doing good things for others. Obviously this is not easy to do, and therefore, requires great faith. But charismatics teach that by doing this you will receive great rewards.

I found this principle very interesting because what it means is that when someone does you wrong, they have actually done you a very large favor. They have provided you an opportunity to receive some great reward. But only if you can absorb the wrong, and convert it!

Now, finally, how all this relates to casinos...

In my (limited) experience with casinos I have concluded that they apparently use some of these charismatic principles to help them profit. Of course this suggests that they don't need to be the least bit religious to apply these principles. The only requirement is that they understand the principles, and apply them religiously (assiduously)!

Most people are probably aware that casinos will happily provide free, or very inexpensive food, drinks, entertainment, and often, even free hotel rooms to their guests. And most people generally understand that the casino hopes to gain their money through other means. And, most people even understand that the deck is stacked in the casino's favor. But I don't think most people suspect just how stacked it is. Or, more specifically, how it is stacked. In other words I don't think that most people would ever suspect that many, if not most, casinos are taking advantage of charismatic (actually Christian) principles in their daily operations despite their generally non-Christian nature. According to these Christian principles, by giving you free, or inexpensive gifts they are assuring their right to recover some multiple of their investment.

Since I first became familiar with this principle I have heard it referred to many times. But I have never known it to have a name. So I have named it "Casino Logic", because in my mind casinos make the most consistent use of these specific profit related principles.

Now that you know what I mean when I use the term casino logic, you'll know what I'm talking about when I mention it in future commentaries.

Have an opinion you'd like to share? Send it to me!

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