I love the game, but lately I am questioning myself if cash games are right for me. When I lose, I am dissapointed. When I win, I feel bad because I see my opponent is sad and dissapointed. I have this dilema if I should continue with the game I truly love.
Can somebody tell me why is it OK for me to take other people's money in cash games.

Because it is the object of the game.

If you don't like that, then either don't play to win, or play at a stake level where you feel like nobody is hurt. Or switch to another pastime.

Because they are playing the game willingly. They chose to risk the money that they are playing with, so if they lose, that just means they willingly gave you the money. Would you be upset if someone on the streets randomly handed you $100 note? No.

They would't feel bad if they took your money dude. And if they couldn't afford to lose it, they shouldn't have been there and would've lost it inevitably anyway to someone else if not you.

Maybe try playing only online. That way it seems less real to you. Also, since black friday, it's much harder to play online for USA players. It's far less likely IMO that someone would be bumming around online with money that they can't afford to lose today than it was maybe 6 years ago.

Thanks for your help. I agree they are playing willingly and they chose that money they are playing with. In a way they willingly gave you the money, but when they lose they certainly don't look like they gave you their money willingly. Sometimes you can see the sadness on their face. Sometimes they start talking bad and criticize your play. Sometimes it feels like they dispise you. Maybe even hate you.
I don't know if I want to be part of making people feel that way.

Thanks for all the help. You right they wouldn't feel bad if they took my money. Very well put that if they couldn't afford to lose it, they shouldn't have been there and would have lost it to someone else if not me.

I just don't know if I want to continue being part of a business that takes money away from their customers without providing them with a service. I just feel like it is a cut throat kind of business and personally I usually like the people I play with live.

You are an entertainer and have provided the other players with a form of entertainment for a variable fee.

The service you have provided is what you get paid for!

Most people I've played with live are really just there to socialize. Others are there for the thrill. A few are there to win. Nobody is being hung out to dry really, other than the bad players expecting to win I suppose.

Poker is a cutthroat sport. Absolutely. It's also a product of a cutthroat world.

I've mentioned this before but I'll bring it up again because it's not uncommon that I hear new players struggling to morally rationalize the hyper-competitive drive that you need to be successful in this game.

I came into poker from a boxing and martial arts background, and before that a high school/college sports background.

There's millions of kids every year who dedicate their lives to their favorite games and don't make it anywhere with it. That's sad. In boxing, it gets worse.

Sometimes you're fighting some rich kid with everything to prove. His parents might have paid for all of his coaching with the best instructors around, he might have some personal doctor that only works for his family, his parents might have even paid to have a gym built at their mansion to train out of.

That's not usually the case.

A lot of times, you'll be fighting someone who's taking a fight because they need a win just to pay their coaches and rent. Sometimes you'll be fighting someone who needs a win just to get their family out of debt. Sometimes you'll get approached by another fighter to help prepare them for their upcoming match, and you'll know that they don't even have health insurance, but that they're going to end up in that ring regardless of whether you help them out or not. I've had people tell me after a fight that they lost because they couldn't afford food in the weeks before the fight. Once I had to rush a friend in my car over to the apartment of a nurse I knew because he couldn't afford to go to a hospital after a fight that he shouldn't have taken.

In poker, the worst thing that can happen is some money loss. In many other sports, the stakes are much higher.

BMX and Motorcross riders, race car drivers, skateboarders can get paralyzed and even die in what is essentially a non-contact sport. In the most regrettable of all rare incidences, prize fighting is a sport where one man can win by taking the other person's life with a punch. And while that is never the intention behind the punch, the punch is still thrown with full knowledge of the potential consequences of the power behind it.

So, in my opinion, money loss is pretty low on the list of bad things that can happen to you in any kind of contest. You don't even have to be some kind of addict or suffer from mental illness to die in a lot of sports.

It's an unfortunate fact of all competition that sympathy inside of competition for your opponent is a mental leak. The upside is that it's the sign of a great competitor that one can show no remorse during a contest as well as great respect and courtesy to their rivals outside of it.

There's a switch you have to be able to decide to flip on and off in your head in order to be able to do this. It's a conscious choice.

But when I leave the casino with more money than I came with, a common occurrence, I always sleep very well that night.

The rules of the game are the same for all players and commonly agreed upon at all times. It's not a sport when there is only winners and no losers.

thats correct, your giving them entertainment for their $$$, if they are sad too bad. and if you lost would they give you a refund? never....so why should you?

Anybody else feel exactly the opposite about this?

eg: on the spectrum of interesting games to play, poker is fairly mediocre IMO, but sadly people won't gamble on other games so you are forced to concentrate all your effort on poker if you want the money that bad players are giving away...

Juk

See also the thread 'If your own grandma was on the felt across from you?'

Btw, I explain the social value of the poker 'job' exactly like DanJWarburton (which, in turn, makes me advocate against online masstabling, as it's of far less fun to the opponents, and I'm subsconsciously afraid of sanctions from my iPoker skins for not being a 'good entertainer').

Thanks for all the replies. It's great input and I feel much better about taking people's money without feeling bad. Like you said if it was boxing the repercussions would have been much worse. Live cash games is entertainment that the players provide; we sit there for many hours that it would be a waste if you would not try to make money doing it or enjoy it.
Thanks again.

That's poker mate. Most of the gamblers say something like this: "No one force you to play this game, you play because you want to play."

But for you to win some people have to lose, and there are so many good players out there, making millions a month. Now think:

[thinking] If they make millions, how many and how much money have loser players deposit? And don't forget the biggest slice of the cake goes to the poker room/casino.

The trued is that are many addicted players that lose everything in the game, but TV shows don't show those, just show the glamor of the final table's.

I play poker because I like to play poker, but I know that this world is more dark that people actually think (those who want to think).

Life have many crossroads, the hard ones and the easy ones. The hard ones are the path's made of principle that leads to character/integrity. You have to chose what you really want, I can't chose it for you, it wouldn't be fair.

Probably not.
The DOJ showed that Stars and Fulltilt both converted only about 1/3 of deposits to rake. The other 2/3 gets withdrawn by winners.

Yes, I didn't use the right words and I didn't knew what I was saying in that line. I'm not against poker or any other betting game... and I don't think that PokerStars/Full Tilt Poker are rigged, but I know, NO I'm sure that poker in the wrong hands can be deadly, because this industry tends to say that this is a game of skills not luck and people think that everything is a rainbow/easy.

What is it that you like about the game exactly?
Maybe play money is the best option? (Or freeroll tournaments), or maybe home games with family and friends? That way you can enjoy the game but not feel bad about "taking people's money".

You are not part of what's making people feel that way, they are. Their misconceptions about why you're there and why they're there are causing them personal and irrational resentment towards you when you win. It's their problem, not yours, so don't internalize it.

When anyone "incorrectly" expresses this personal animosity towards me in a game, I personally feel that I am in a good game.

It's because the player made the decision to gamble/risk his/her money. They are hoping to win but they are prepared to lose. You should be too.

Strictly, you're not taking someones money by winning. You're just better (or at least luckier) in a game which you both had to pay an entry-fee for.