You might be better suited for a "communism or pro-china style dictatorship" forum then 2p2.

You should stop spending so much time posting on 2p2 and go dedicate every free moment you have (away from you 40-50hr a week normal job) and go find the cure for cancer.

I bet u can do it bro, until then I accept free choice b/c and I already have a FT job and volunteer ~12 hours a month to social causes.

The other 4-6 free friday/sat nights i have i will prob drink beer at the local pub, play some pool, travel, go to the movies, and play poker once or twice.

I never mentioned anything about politics. You're not even responding to my argument. And you're correct that I'm wasting time on twoplustwo, but that has nothing to do with my argument either. I made a claim about human suffering, which you have yet to address. I don't care what you do for a living or how much time you spend volunteering. That also has nothing to do with my argument.

You fail to understand that every business, organization, object, or idea exploits someone in some way.
Everything from Church to the "American Dream", fast food, video games, and public housing included.

Stop looking for someone to hold your hand, it wont happen.

fyp

Of course every business exploits someone in some way. But not every form of exploitation causes the same depth of current/potential suffering. And to plead ignorance as a society and pretend we don't realize this is a moral atrocity. We don't have to intend to exploit others in ways that we know will cause harm. We can avoid that if we're trying to provide services to each other that we honestly believe to be moving society towards outcomes of less suffering.

I'm indifferent to people who choose to destroy themselves...and then others who use that as an EXCUSE to keep everyone else from enjoying the things they destroy themselves with. Cigarettes don't kill you if you don't smoke them everyday. Alcohol doesn't ruin your life if you don't drink everyday. Drugs don't kill you if do them in moderation. Gun murders kill less than half as many people as the flu in the U.S.

BTW, my dad drank himself to death. He was an irresponsible moron for doing it. Doesn't mean I should be a Prohibitionist sadistic statist self righteous loon-bag.

Personal repsonsibility, plain and simple. It's not up to ALL of us to make sure YOU, and others you seem so sympathetic to, to grow up and control yourselves. I have no problem NOT smoking, drinking, shooting heroin, and not shooting innocent people with my assault rifles.

And I also don't **** hookers...but they sure are great people. They never judge you...you could learn something from those dirty whores.

So take your "genetically/environmentally" sad excuses and GTFO. Are you ****ing kidding me?!? The bottle doesn't hold a gun to your head! You choose to pick it up and put it too your lips, degen! Same goes for all vices. THEY ARE INANIMATE OBJECTS. You are NOT powerless to resist them. I'm "genetically/environmentally" predisposed to be a complete drunk/drug addict/smoker/gambling addict/ murderer/ etc...and yet I'm ****ing NOT one. Why?

I don't make excuses for my own behavior despite high risk factors. In short, I'm not mentally ill and seeking some PARENT to prevent me from doing things.

Government isn't supposed to be a parent for adults. If you can't grow up, that's natural selection. See ya! Better you than me.

Your so-called "empathy" is just your excuse for degeneracy for state-addiction (addiction to compulsory government as a tool to sadistically tyrannize otherwise free people).

Yeah, let's screw the 94% out of freedoms because 6% can't handle it...right, because we're all just children in need of parent. (SARCASM!)

Like I said, these help-a-degen articles draw statists like flies to ****.

Hence why I'm anti-political...tyranny of the majority, elections; just argumentum ad populum. When you organize "society" (a collection of individuals) forcibly according to an informal logical fallacy you'll get "the government you deserve". The majority was wrong about almost everything in history. But don't let that deter you.

They wouldn't of voted to end the popular institution of slavery (it took a draft to get people to fight against the secession of the South), to end bans on interracial marriage, to end segregation of the military (done by excecutive order), to give women the vote (not even all women, half the population, were for it), to end the Holocaust (which the majority supported, or supported the states that did it, in fascist countries), etc.,etc.,etc.

Again and again the mechanisms of democracy and republics have failed to be sufficient to protect human dignity, rights, and freedom...all because they felt ending these things (like slavery) was BAD for "society". They enacted the atroctities (like the Holocaust) for the GOOD of "society". Human rights are irrelevant to such collectivist thinking. Hence why individualism is much preferable to the minority than collectivism. The sadists and masochists and the majority LOVE collectivism.

The difference between you and people who want theocracy and all the statism and bans that go with it...an opinion on what's "good" for "society". How about you let individuals choose for themselves? How about stop being such a control freak?

"Society" is code language for those who cheerlead tyranny.

Laws shouldn't be made with the assumption angels will enforce them...but with the assumption devils will. A just law is one that cannot be abused in the worst hands, not one that can be enforced justly in only virtuous man's hands. For this reason banning things based on simple value judgements of lynch mobs (crowds), as opposed to individual preferences, that do not cause DIRECT and MEASURABLE harm or fraud to anyone but WILLING participants are the welcome mat for a future tyrant.

If you hate 2nd hand smoke, don't frequent places the OWNER of the property happens to allow smoking...it's that simple, my ban-happy friend.

Sure it harms some people. So does alot of things. Alot of people find enjoyment doing it losing just as recreation. Some make money at it. Anyway you keep putting walls up here and there. You may find there is something taken away from you. That you enjoy and love to do. Just to protect a few.

I think what OP was trying to say is this:

I realize this is a poker forum and there are a bunch of really good players on here. I'll also assume most of you are under 25. The question is did you really see yourself playing poker "professionally" for the next 30-40 years hitting buttons on a computer?

The game has become so hard to beat nowadays....its light years from where it was just 5 years ago. You see the same moves at .25/.50 that you do at $25/$50. The thought that most of you think that you could and would continue to beat this game is actually insane. Add in the fact that you would have to move up in limits (to try to give yourself a "raise"), get health benefits, 401k, married, kids etc etc...hey good luck with that.

I realize that this is/was alot of people's livelihood on here. However, I think that a "kick in the ass" (banning online poker in the US) is what most people needed to get out of their fantasyland. You can bet that 5-10 years from now, a helluva lot of people will look back on this and say that BF saved their lives.

Also FWIW..the govt can suck my balls. I didnt agree with what they did, but the fact is that there are alot of people here who will be thankful that they were "forced" to do something else other than playing poker.

+1,000,000. Excellent post sir.

meh its all about free choice, if you dont see that, just stop living.

About the games getting tougher: I think a lot of it has to do with gray legal area, poor economy, and sites not being in the best interest for the long term sustainability of the game (e.g not outlawing HUDs, which allows bumhunting and scare away fish). These things can be taken care of without BF.

Otherwise, you would question why live is multiple times softer (in terms of winrate) even at much higher stakes, and even with rake being multiple times higher.

OP is obv trolling...cant believe people are responding to his bs

Neither OP or I made up any number or claim to have any data. We merely gave opinions (the word "view" in the title is a clear demonstration of this) that, based on the number of responses in this thread, clearly gave some food for thought. What OP said is clearly true for some players, there is no doubt about that. There is certainly a case to be made either way about the overall net effect.

And for what it is worth, Black Friday did not positively or negatively affect me either way, I do not live in the US, have never played on FT and have played very little poker in 2011.

Also, look at mikeinyonker's post for an extremely interesting and compelling argument on the subject (far better than yours).

nah he might be christian, they think and talk retarded sh.it lik that

This is a good post and yes this is part of what I am saying, there is a large number of players that fit into this category.
Young, intelligent people snared by a dream.

I think online poker can trap a larger pool than online gambling like roulette for example. Intelligent people may know they cant beat the house, but they might not accept they cant beat poker or they might not accept its not the best option for them to make a living from....long term.

After all, which is more attractive, working 9-5 or making millions online. But online poker promises these young men so much, but will give so little in the end, to the majority.