Please also give me the chance to respond to the key parts of radialot's viewpoints and to REG's links they posted.

There are naturally a few components to the discussion and it can't be simplified down to a pure yes/no or agree/disagree answer IMO, although some posters have said that it can.

You only need to look at REG's own analysis of the ethics question to see that it is a fairly complex subject containing a number of factors and areas to explore and analyse.

I fail to see how even if one was to assume that playing poker is immoral, that one would reach the conclusion that donating money gained from playing poker to charities is immoral.





Slaving, killing and stealing are generally immoral (could be some situations that may not be and a lot of them may be arguable; i.e. killing in self defense, stealing food from a corrupt government that is starving its citizens). Donating to charity is generally not immoral (assuming the charity is really being charitable).

The slaver, killer and thief donating money to the charity is ok; I have no problem with them for doing that. The slaving, killing and stealing is a problem. So, money they want to donate goes to charity; they get arrested and go to jail.

Okay that is a clear cut view you have and I respect your point of view.

If you read REG's links you will see that they have questioned the ethics of poker winnings donations to charity by doing some quite in depth analysis of it, so do have a line somewhere regarding ethics. They actually struggled quite hard IMO using "evidence" (which I will later challenge) to get poker on to the right side of the line, so I would be very surprised if they agreed with the part of your post that I have bolded.

Are you saying that (i) it is immoral/wrong for the slaver, killer or thief to donate to charity or (ii) it is immoral/wrong for a charity to accept donations from a slaver, killer or thief, particularly when such donations were funded by slaving, killing and stealing?


Because I was talking about clause (i) and it seems to me that REG was talking about, and would generally be more concerned about, clause (ii). And REG would likely also be concerned about taking the action set forth in clause (ii) for reasons other than morality. If a charity is found to get a large amount of donations from, or otherwise be somehow closely connected with, a slaver, killer or thief, then the legitimacy and image of that charity is going to suffer and donations may drop.




EDIT:

Just, by the way, I've never heard of REG before and don't know any details about it.

The thread title involves both, but clause (ii) certainly. Clause (i) can only be influenced if the charity has the desire and ability to vet donators.

You're spot on. Many charities not just for moral reasons but for image reasons, as many charities do, have an exclusion list of acceptable types of donators.

Ultimately, a charity whose purpose is to do good is concerned about avoiding mixing in any bad in the processes required to create good as the end result.

More awareness of REG is good. I'm questioning an aspect of REG and will be offering some constructive ideas.

Sage is the guy who was defending Torelli, arguing he wasn't cheating or angleshooting. He is quite the authority on ethics and poker.

False.

I said that it was at the top end of the angling scale, but not cheating. I also went on to say that it's really a case of language semantics whether to call him an angler or a cheat and that what he did was very wrong.

My only "defense" of him was that he's now taken enough punishment, so people should now back off attacking him, particularly as weak or non existent application of the rules enabled him to angle, and that statistically a lot his attackers have done various forms of shady stuff themselves in the past.

Well, I suppose you could make them part of the same question since they're just two sides of the same transaction. The thing is, "is it ethical that it is given?" is a pretty silly question. How can it ever be unethical to donate, in the context in which you started this thread? The acts that generated the money could be unethical, but once that money is earned from poker, how could it ever be unethical to donate to a legitimate charity?

How am I stopping you? Go ahead.

BTW, why did you bother proposing this 100 word post idea in the first place if you're going to moan about it every third post? Of course it's tough; I'd never be able to live within such a limit - so I wouldn't make the suggestion.

no one who takes a tax exemption from donating thinks there is anything wrong with killers and thieves donating to charity since the government is basically paying a portion of your donation and every government has murdered or robbed someone.

No **** Sherlock.

Hi Alec!

I guess it was a form of conscious or maybe subconscious penance for my
previous long winded posting sins.

Unfortunately I can still read quotes from SageDonkey even if you ignore the guy.

fwiw, after torelli put up that 35min video on yt he just confirmed everything.
I don't see any other legitimate arguments in this thread other then speculation and what if's.

I think it's mind boggling that anyone is buying that crappy video of torelli.

I've never put anyone on ignore because someone you may think is a moron today you may realise isn't one tomorrow.

REG discuss the issue I have raised and related issues on their own web site.

Something I haven't mentioned before is that in my Twitter exchange with Liv Boeree, involving very similar Qs & As to those ITT, Liv concluded by tweeting to me "you are more of an idealist than me". Which does fit a utilitarian view compared to a pure ethics view.

I probably am but not to the point of being unrealistic.

It may not be "bad" per se, but in the case of Dan Smith's charity drive specifically he for sure made himself look extremely good. In a podcast said the catalyst was making 6 figure DFS bets/swings giving him perspective that he could/should help others. He added that he timed the donations favourably for tax write off time of year.

My tweet to him was (in bold above), and that he was insulting people's intelligence if they can't give to charity without him telling the poker world that he'd match any donations. He could have publicised the charities without boasting.

Players donating to charity has echoes of people purchasing carbon credits to compensate for their airline travel.

People will walk straight past a rough sleeper on their way to work, and in a few internet clicks they've absolved themselves of carbon emissions spending a small amount of their expendable income. But what about the rough sleeper they walked past, is he/she less important to help? I will discuss this in my replies to REG.

My point is, with both poker donations and carbon off sets that for the (UK) middle classes, money spent absolves. But it's an oversimplification of reality.

Must be nice, being called more of an idealist by a poker player. lol.
I made the mistake by opening the thread without logging in and couldn't help myself replying.

I put you on ignore not because you are a "moron".
you talk allot but you don't say that much, thats why.
Take this post for example...

You're moving the goalposts again. I notice you have a (inadvertent) tendency to conflate different issues which tends to confuse the debate.

You originally applied the terms "middle class", "coffee shop" and "elitist" to utilitarian-based views on how to allocate charitable donations, while now you are arguing as if you had applied them to players giving to (whatever) good causes.

You have raised at least 4 separate issues itt:

(1) Is making money by playing poker immoral? [Debatable - it has both positive and negative effects]

(2) Is giving to charity immoral/unsavoury/elitist? [No]

(3) When giving, is it elitist/middle-class/coffee-shop to choose where to give based on utilitarian views? [No, not elitist, but much argument among philosophers about which moral system is most appropriate]

(4) Should your posts be self-limited to 100 words? [I don't care as long as whatever posts you do make clarify issues rather than confuse them.]

Historically a huge number of NVG posters have attacked me for the length of my posts, so probably wise that I stick to 100 words.

I get that it looks like I am conflating issues, I am not. If I had 1000 or maybe 10000 words available I could demonstrate this.

Carbon offsets are relevant to utilitarianism (beliefs) if made at the expense of not donating to a cause with an apparent lower total benefit. They are also in some people's cases an example of people with higher incomes (more expendable income) being able to purchase integrity and goodness.

Ugh.

I assume you mean this:



Unfortunately, I suck at Twitter, so I can't seem to display the conversation, but I'm pretty sure I get the gist of it from your post and his Tweets.

What comes to my mind is - seriously? You need to find some hobbies other than criticizing how people choose to donate money and publicize it. Much like many of your posts here, nothing positive comes of this - more likely to have negative results.

Strikes me as a symptom of a real social media ill going around - people spending way too much time judging others (usually based on very incomplete information) rather than looking after their own business.

Kind of like I'm doing now, so it's off to bed with me.

Nice work Bobo. I mean that.

I already declared that I tweeted Dan direct. His answers don't change my view. He benefited tremendously image wise. He could as easily, possibly even more effectively so, promoted the charities he's passionate about by extensively tweeting their merits.

But he chose a very subtle form of emotional leverage to take double the credit for something that IMO he should have been more modest and humble about in the first place.

As previously stated, I will be offering some positive ideas later on, and I do support REG but not all of its philosophy.

Why should somebody be modest about giving? He knows he's a known poker player and tries to get other people on board, whats bad about that?
It maybe made him feel better, who cares? most people feel better about themselves when do give to charity.
He timed it for tax write off, as he should, why would he not to? it would be just plain stupid.

even for people not known in their communities its not bad to be vocal about giving if there is a slight chance in extra donations.

As Bobo stated, stop judging and start doing what you think is best and let other people be.

so effing what...MANY people, including those who would never even PLAY poker do the same thing. If not for the write-off, the contribution would likely never have occurred, or would certainly not be in the same amount.

It matters not one whit what the intention might be behind the donation...how about simply dealing with the fact that a donation has been made and, in theory, should benefit other people served by the charity.

.

Publicising donations and saying if you give I give takes self publicising to a new level. If he'd $200K to give, maybe it was $300K, it was certainly a huge and generous figure, why didn't he just give the money without stating the amount and additionally say he'd donated and would recommend the same to others based on reasons X, Y and Z.

He would have had 10 times more chance of me donating using that method. The method he used leaves a bad taste and makes me question his motives.