That's only a problem if you believe a vanity donation is worse than no donation. Which apparently, you do.

lol, "Wow, just wow" is perhaps greatest rhetorical tell on the internet that someone has nothing to say really and is trying to inject some normative outrage instead.

However, to reduce to absurdity your ridiculous feigned ethical dilemna, it is not accurate to assume that there have been no losers, in the economic sense, along the typical donor's process of amassing significant wealth from which funds are donated.

If you think no one else lost money along the way while John D. Rockefeller or Andrew Carnegie amassed their respective fortunes, you have no clue about the source of wealth behind their donations.

Forget those Robber Baron guys however, let's look at Alfred Nobel, yes, that "Nobel":

"Known for inventing dynamite, Nobel also owned Bofors, which he had redirected from its previous role as primarily an iron and steel producer to a major manufacturer of cannon and other armaments"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Nobel

SD, if they offer you a Nobel Prize for your contributions to education through your NVG posts, you best turn it down I guess.

Finally, fyp as not everyone has an opinion.

Op is saying that a winning poker player is a sort of bad guy, and a winning poker player who (publicly!) donates money is even worse. That's the point of this thread in a nutshell, an opportunity to whine about his perverse view of things.

I thought the whole purpose of effective altruism, which the REG charity is a part of, was channel charitable money to organizations that would use it to help people most efficiently, without regard to things like the publicity the cause receives or one's personal connection to it.

This would exclude "vanity" donations and also exclude organizations where the bulk of the money goes toward the operation of the organization. But also giving money specifically to an LV charity or an anti-gambling charity as some sort of penance for how you made the money would go against the mission of the charity, which is to help the most people without regard to the donor's personal feelings.

I completely agree that if you break things down and forensically anaylse the source of most/all money you usually find something unethical, undesirable, or not favourable to society somewhere in the chain.

However, I am talking about professional poker players, an occupation where it is very easy to see the exact mechanics of how the income is achieved.

If we cast a general attitude of well everything is the world is so messed up anyway, then we are not looking at the degree of things. Not everything is the same.

Sage,

Poker money going to charity is a great thing and not even close to questionable imo. Money, (nearly)regardless of it's origin, going to a "good" cause is a net positive for the world. I suggest googling Peter Singer, or better yet listening to "Being Good and Doing Good" podcast by Sam Harris with Oxford Philosopher Will McAskill. That should do a much better job introducing you to the ethics of giving than I or my fellow geniuses here at 2p2 can.

Cheers.

I am not saying poker players are bad people. There occupation is rather parsitical and exploitative but these type of legal occupations do exist.

I am putting forward a potential conflict between how their earnings are achieved and them then "doing good" with a percentage of the earnings. One should consider the net good they are achieving.

There are some other factors in some cases such as vanity.

I never said that the amassing of wealth/capital was "not favourable to society". I was just pointing out how wrong you are in your premise that because someone loses along the way, the winner's donation to charity raises profound some ethical dilemna.

SD, how do you play poker and sleep comfortably that night, assuming you win ?

Since literally anyone can nominate anyone for a Nobel Prize, someone may put you to the test, nominate you, and see if you'd turn one down:

"On top of that, there’s no set criteria for who you can nominate or why. The entire process seems so laissez faire that they don’t even have an official submission form, and they give out the email address on their website. (It’s postmaster@nobel.no, if you want to say hello.) Here’s all that’s required in that illustrious email:

• the name of the candidate,
• an explanation of why the individual or organisation is considered by the nominator to be a worthy candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize,
• and the name, title and academic or professional affiliation of the nominator."

https://qz.com/801455/how-do-you-get...l-peace-prize/

There are a lot of good things about REG but my view is that there is still some vanity involved and that there is still a conflict regarding money from poker players.

The part, if the case, about them giving no money to the effects of gambling charities IMO displays a sort of ivory tower mentality to not acknowledge the realities behind the source of the income.

Poker is a worse than a zero sum game so unfortunately someone has to lose.

Most other occupations are a progression of the barter system. Gaming would be except for too many huge losers.

I've stated on other threads when I was a live cash grinder I did it in the 100% knowledge that I was a parasite hoping and praying every second I was at the table that the biggest fish would sit at my table, looking to stack them regardless of any negative consequences to him/her and his/her life.

Poker is legal but in certain ways quite unethical.

An ethical OP would post some threadsavers as a charitable offering to the unfortunate sods that read this page.

Thank you I will read up on that. I am keen to learn.

I have no involvement with REG charity, so maybe I shouldn't speak for it.

But I don't think it REG is not "acknowledging the realities", it just takes a utilitarian perspective on it. Someone playing poker and giving their winnings to REG may be perfectly aware that they are creating a social bad by playing poker professionally. If they gave those winnings to an inefficient charity that targeted gambling, that would be social good, but the inefficiency of the charity would mean that the whole circle of transactions was still a net social bad.

In contrast, by giving to an efficient charity, they are using that money to create more social good than the social bad that was created by winning the money. So the circle of transactions is a net social good.

This isn't being blind to reality, it is a calculated decision about whom to hurt and whom to help to create the most overall good. You can say this utilitarian way of going about thing is an "ivory tower mentality", but it is not an unexamined one.

And you thought running to NVG with this opinion was the right thing to do. What do you think that says about you?

It is not the act of losing, it is the method by which the losses are created.

If we take this to an extreme, it is well know that organised crime gangs are prominent givers to charity. I am not saying winning from poker is a crime, of course it is not, but I think there is an ethical scale regarding method of income and poker is in the bottom (bad) half of the scale somewhere.

There's a victim somewhere down the chain with everything that makes money.
If people only gave to their victims, a lot of causes would never get a penny.

Whener I give to charity, I'd rather it go to help someone who was never in a position to help themselves.

Cancer. Famine relief. You know, worthy charities.

Things like Gamblers Anonymous, IMO, don't need or deserve funding as their 'cure' is 'words'. They're free.

I like a debate. I question things and try to look at them in depth.

I am very confident that my points are valid in some areas, the vanity thing is a cert for some players, (less so perhaps for REG badge wearers).

I could easily be wrong on absolutely everything else, let's see.

Just a babe in the woods. "Local man believes winning at poker is unkind and parasitic. More at 11."

Okay, now we are getting somewhere. Well put. A conflict.

Perhaps they think they are scientists or something, their innate superiority giving them the power to shape the world in the way they intellectually see fit with the choices of damage versus repair being theirs alone.

I think I now get it. Has anyone got the link to where I sign up for a REG badge?

You don't need a badge

So, playing losing poker is unethical in your view ? Or is it playing winning poker that is unethical ? Or is it playing poker at all that you think raises the ethical dilemna ?

What about collecting rake ?

Try harder before you post further, Socrates

I don't understand. What is the ethical dilemma? Are you saying that poker players should feel guilt for earning their income in the first place and that donating doesn't reconcile it? Because I disagree that the players should feel any guilt for being winners.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

Maybe they just think that growns ups who can take care of themselves and make their own decisions aren't as deserving as as people who've had their life destroyed by out side circumstances.

I donate money to the elderly and wounded vets. The only thing gambling addicts get is my thanks, and the thanks of the vets and the elderly who they donated to.

THIS , Please ?