There's a generational gap here that younger people may never understand.

In the USA, the boomer generation, if they wanted to gamble, they had to do business with the mafia.

For some reason, pop culture has glorified doing business with the mafia.

It wasn't as simple as driving to your local cardroom and playing poker. Often enough, your local underground mafia games were rigged. (According to my grandfather)

Take this iconic sports photo from the 60s. Ali was shouting "GET UP AND FIGHT"



Even the FBI suspected that this match was rigged. Do some research on the documents that were FOIA'd decades later. There's evidence to suggest that Liston was going to take a dive.

Not only that, horse races Hawthorne Race Course in Chicago were famously rigged by Al Capone and winning race tickets were used as method to pay people under the table. If Capone was doing it, other gangsters were likely doing it too.

My grandfather passed away 20 years ago, but I remember hearing some of these stories first hand. Some of which, I probably shouldn't repeat. I have no way of knowing if they are true or not.

Like a poster above said... Getting knee capped is probably the most notable way the mafia collected insolvent debts.

Another debt collection method they used is to force you to perform a crime, or they would kidnap/hurt your family.

If you approach boomer's concerns from this perspective, it makes more sense.

It's socially acceptable to be against all forms of gambling, so most people are against all forms of gambling for that reason alone. Logic is secondary/irrelevant to most people, it doesn't matter how simple it is.

Who cares what your family thinks - I remember I told my uncle I was playing for a living years ago and he laughed, meanwhile I had one year online I made almost 300k so I got the last laugh on him. Most people in life hate their jobs so expect negative reactions to what people consider a dream job. Never care what anyone thinks of you in life - be brutally honest with your self and make your own judgements.

Good One.

You're a genius.

Congratulations.

I thought so,

you're not, and,

my question was rhetorical, there was no need to post a response.

Never caring what anyone thinks of you in life seems a sub-optimal strategy for living.

Hobbes described such as life as one which was

[t]he natural condition of mankind, a state of war in which life is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”.

..... which perhaps describes a lot of unsuccessful, resentful. would-be grinders, but not successful people with some balance in their lives, which typically involves some family ties.

Sorry, but your Hawthorne Race course concept seemingly missed the mark. Al Capone probably did not need or bother to generate "winning race tickets at Hawthorne" to pay someone in lieu of cash during his tenure in Chicago. Cash was king, as recently as 10 years ago.

(No disrespect to your grandfather, glad he shared such things with you.)

Were races at Hawthorne ever suspect, sure . So were Washington Park and Sportsmen's, on a par with jai-lai in Miami and at the MGM in Las Vegas probably. .... I used to get an occasional tip like 50 years ago, and they always were good. Otoh, Hawthorne had some consistent cards that were pretty easy to pick winners on, if you stuck to a couple of races and match-ups per week.

I legitimately hope everything my grandfather told me about those days was a lie.

I remember him telling me that when the mob would rig races, jockeys on the best horses would be terrified to make a move. If they won a rigged race on accident, they were likely signing their own death certificate.

Whether he's right or wrong, my point is that many old timers automatically assumed that if you gambled, you were not only putting your bankroll at risk, you were putting your family at risk. That's why many shunned the idea of gambling entirely... even if you we're wagering upon a game of skill.

I'm from a family of professionals, valedictorians, etc. (I'm not that.) They don't say much about it. I did have a psychoanalyst friend, when she heard the rundown of all their positions she said, "Oh, they must be proud of you." LOL. Outrageous comment.

Ditch the friend.

Nah, that's just funny! What's some sarcastic teasing between friends?

Already buried her. She loved me but was just of an extreme academic and professional family and mindset where little else mattered, at least in that realm. Her comment was half biting, half teasing. I was on the heater of a lifetime when I knew her, and would call her at like 2 AM driving home. We were both big night owls. "What time is? You crazy bastard," she would blurt out. Picture that an 80-something year old lady saying that. "Blurting out" was kind of her modus operandi in life. She went from dissing poker to, "Teach me how to play." I wrote a book about her ... if a thousand people buy it I'll give the title.

I'm a recreational player, playing mostly in clubs around Ireland, with occasional trips for European tournaments, and many Vegas trips, including WSOP.

I have never encountered negative opinion about it - if anything most people see it as an interesting and slightly exotic hobby - the most common comment is "Cool!".

Some people have Googled me and found sites like Hendon Mob which show winnings, but not buy-ins, so they think I'm doing a lot better than I am. On-line, for example, I am a losing player, but the site shows on-line earnings close to half a million - very misleading.

I had one major run-in with my bank, where I made the mistake of transferring the funds for the WSOP main event in one go. This triggered an investigation. When they Googled me and found poker pictures, they labelled me a professional gambler, and it took many months to get their anti money laundering team off my back.

Family was mildly alarmed when I revealed I was playing for real money (started as free bar poker), but when the cash started rolling in they saw the value. They still think having a real career is very important and poker should be secondary though which can be a source of friction at times.

This is horrible advice. Humans are social creatures and We all concern with what others think about us at some degree. Generally, the closer the people are to us (our inner circle) the more we care what they think. And that's how people are programed. It's in us through evolution to think about what others think about ourselves. Just look at this forum. Isn't a forum for reading from others and see what people think about?

I think the logic behind the "who cares what people think" is that it makes us so high/mighty/important and what people thinks about us is beneath us, not important and should be brushed aside. Either that or it may be a defensive mechanism to sweep criticism whether justifiable or not under the rug.

Wtf are you talking about? Anyone who's highly successful didn't care what others think - the more successful you want to be the more doubt/criticism there will be, and you need to be confident in yourself. Your logic is terrible.

Ultra successful people don't have balance in their lives - there's a tradeoff for success. If your life is focused on what others think you'll never live a fulfilled life - you'll be cautious with all your actions making sure to please everyone around you. Some horrible advice on this forum as of late, but not surprising as most people here are broke losers.

The problem is mostly that people who express disapproval of poker as a job almost certainly don't really understand anything about it.

How many of you have told people that you're a serious poker player and they said something like "are you good at counting cards"?

Even some people who know how poker works and have played it a few times often don't understand how anyone could consistently make money at it.

It would be the rough equivalent of me telling someone they shouldn't become a surgeon because they could accidentally kill someone.

Unless someone actually understands how poker works, it would be ridiculous to even take their opinions into consideration.

If 1 in 25 surgeons made a great living, 15 lost more than they won, and the rest fell somewhere in between - on top of which, 5 of them were scumbags or grifters of some kind - your grandparents or in-laws would not have to know anything about performing surgery to know they don't want you to be a surgeon.

If I met such people, I would be happy to prove them wrong. 100k hands of heads up NLHE should do it nicely.

If there was such a thing as amateur surgery, much worse things than that would happen.

No professional poker players lose more than they win, by definition.

I'm pretty sure you entirely missed the point of my post.

Weirdly, I've never met a real life person who would oppose me playing. Parents are just like "You still play poker. Oh you do, how much are you up lately?". And my friends are like "Can you borrow some money?".

Some might not completely understand it of course and think I've just been a bit lucky, but as long as I don't lose my rent money, people consider as just another hobby, at worst. Most think it's cool to hear that I did it for a living for a few years, and still make some extra income from it.

I DO have a friend who I talk about dating and stuff a lot with, and his opinion is that I should never mention poker on a tinder profile and such. His view is that women might not want to date someone they view as a degenerate, delusional gambler. I've never personally met a woman in my life who would think badly of poker, though and I'm pretty sure that his opinion is just a negative stereotype. Note: He is a poker player himself and knows I make money out of it.

Trust me, women in their 40s do not want to date a professional poker player. Honestly, that is the biggest drawback for me.

I suppose it's possible in a highly religious and conservative country like the USA. But at least here in Finland I've never met a woman who would oppose poker. I'm sure those exist here as well, but I'm not the type of person who would even meet such people anywhere. I'm a music guy, I mostly hang out with people I've met at clubs and gigs and such. Those kinda people are used to people having other kinds of jobs than standard 9-5 office jobs. Or being out of work, or doing some random jobs here and there to stay afloat. The kind of people who look down at people who play poker for a living would probably look down at people who tell them they are guitarists or DJ's or something as well.

I do know some people like to control their partners and try to mould them into something they are not. Which I never understood really, why not just date suitable men/women/others in the first place? I know couples where the other person had to sell his record collection, because it was "childish s**t" and that wasn't tolerated. And we're talking about 25 years old people here lol. I really don't want to end up in such a relationship.

Point being, if someone doesn't accept me as the way I am, why would I want to date such a person? That kinda relationship is doomed and neither one will probably be happy.

My dating "CV" is kinda hopeless anyway. I do DJ gigs, make electronic music, go to clubs (which a really conservative person probably interprets as doing tons of drugs), I play roleplaying games and miniature games (which means that I'm either a big nerd or worship Satan, or both), I go to punk gigs and hang out with punks (and they're like anarchists who wish to destroy society or whatever). And I play poker. I'm not exactly a model citizen who really uptight people would want to date, or even be friends with.