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The battle lines are being drawn brothers, and if we don't arm ourselves and fight for our side we are going to lose. Conservatively minded folks all across America are slowly becoming more and more organized in the fight against the game we love. "Gambling" they call it, "A sin" they say, adding something about how it ruins people's lives for emphasis.

Poker has a bad name with the people who tend to have the loudest voice. Conservatives, older people, religious zealots, all people who vote more often than we do and all people who are more likely to catch the ear of their local politicians. Don’t think this is a political issue for me either. If Democrats were proposing the bills I would rail against them just as hard, it just happens to be a small group of very conservative legislators that are the problem right now. We have to be the louder voice because damn it we're right! Feel free to use the example below to show the uninitiated around you how poker works and how it is no different than any other competitive activity. Email the article from here down, or the whole thing, to anyone you want, and post it anywhere you like as long as it is unaltered.

Recently the popularity of online poker has caused a few people to seize on a few negative stories and an outdated image of poker as a "shady" game. A few of the more outspoken opponents have attempted to pass laws making it a crime to play the game online because it is "gambling" Roulette is gambling folks, poker is a game of skill, and I have an example below to help you understand how and why.  

In this example we're going to use a Scrabble tournament, but you could substitute darts, bowling, 9-ball, chess or even a chili cook off. There are even video game tournaments big enough to support professional players these days and they work no differently than a poker tournament. The top players in leagues like this one - http://www.thecpl.com/league/ make significant income simply playing video game tournaments.

Whether it's video games or chess, in these tournaments the competitors pay an entry fee, and the prize pool is paid out to the top finishers, just like a poker tournament. The more skilled competitors finish on top and get the lion's share of the prize pool. Like any of these other activities there is no possibility of losing more than your entry fee in a poker tournament. Once you are knocked out of the tournament you can no longer play, and you can't lose any more. Stories about people losing their houses in a big poker game are simply outdated. While it possible to lose great quantities of money in what we refer to as "cash games" that possibility is no different from playing the stock market.

Let's look at the details in our comparison between a poker tournament and a scrabble tournament. Our example tournaments will be the 2005 National Scrabble Championship and the 2005 Empire State Poker Championship, both of which took place during August of 2005. These tournaments were chosen because they happened at nearly the same time and they are both fairly indicative of the majority of tournaments within their respective disciplines.

You can learn about the tournaments through these links - 

http://www.cardplayer.com/poker-tournaments/tournament.php?tid=167

http://www.scrabble-assoc.com/tourneys/2005/nsc/prizes.html

http://www.scrabble-assoc.com/tourneys/2005/nsc/

In both of our example tournaments the participants pay a fixed entry fee and the fees go into a prize pool which is redistributed to the winners on a proportional basis. The winner of the Scrabble tournament actually took home a $25,000 first prize! The most skilled player does not always win, but the most skilled players have the best chance to win, whether it’s poker or scrabble the luck of the draw (in either tiles or cards) will have some effect on the outcome of the games.In both our examples there is a little bit of luck involved in the short run, but if the tournament were played enough times we can expect the best player to win more often than any other. This is really no different from any sporting event or any recreational game. The team who wins the Super Bowl does not win every game all year, and often does not even hold the best record. Without an element of chance there would be very little interest in most of the forms of competition that we all enjoy at home or on television.

Would Senator John Kyl attempt to outlaw Scrabble tournaments? Does Rep. Jim Leach think the lottery is simply a better way to gamble? We may never know because they steadfastly refuse to answer any email I send them. In fact no one who is at the forefront of anti-poker campaigning or who is a sponsor of anti-gambling legislation has ever been willing to agree to a debate with me of any sort. Once they realize that I know what I’m talking about they flee for the fence like any good politician would do.

The anti-poker folks are operating on emotion, religion, and overzealous morality issues. When faced with logic they quickly back down or resort to bible verses or shouting. Occasionally throwing in a story about how someone lost their house because of a gambling addiction seems to make them feel better about their stance as well. The emotional pull of a broken family or a lost house is probably the best argument they have, so let‘s tear that one to pieces as well.

First of let me state that gambling addiction is a sad thing, and I have seen it myself first hand. I’ve also seen sex addicts ruin their families, and I have personally witnessed a family ruined because the mother spent hundreds of dollars a week on lottery tickets. She was just sure she had the right power ball numbers this time. Television, tobacco, the Internet, alcohol, sex, nearly anything can be blamed for an addiction, and the stories from those things are no less depressing than those of gambling addicts. Addictive personalities and mental illness can ruin a family or cost a man his home and his car, but the path he took is not to blame. A person on the road to ruin will always find a way to get there, no matter how many roads you try to block.

Thank God we live in America right? Where all those things are legal and the government doesn’t try to tell us that those things are too dangerous for us to make our own decisions about them. Of course poker has a bad reputation from one too many old westerns, and many people hold a belief that it is “gambling” and therefore evil in some ethereal way that no one can quite put their finger on. I have put as much study and hard work into learning the game of poker as any Scrabble champion, basketball player, doctor or engineer, and I’m about tired of the negative attitude some people carry towards the way I make my living. I think I speak for all of us professional players and many of the amateurs when I say this. What we do for a living deserves just as much respect as any of those professions for the skill level and hard work that it takes to do it.

There are still many people in the world who believe poker is a game of luck and there is no skill involved. I can guarantee you that these people don’t win very often if they play at all. Anyone who believes poker is a game of luck is cordially invited to play me online at any time. A match can be set up easily and guaranteed fair by some of the most prestigious certification firms in the world. We’ll play a best of seven for the whole world to watch and anyone who believes poker is not a game of skill has no chance of winning. Try me.

This is the land of the free and I couldn’t be more proud to be an American. In a land where lottery tickets (actual gambling, no skill involved) are sold on every street corner I would never have expected a contest of skill to be outlawed. Not here. If politicians ask what they should do about online gambling tell them this - Regulate poker and make the tax dollars from it. Keep it safe and secure for your citizens who will do it whether it is legal or not. Prevent organized crime from getting a new foothold in this country the way they did when prohibition started. Do whatever you need to do, but for the sake of those of us who would be out of a job and out of a career -

Don’t Outlaw It!

Poker is a game of skill, keep it legal.

Chris “Fox” Wallace

For more information on keeping poker legal and advice about the laws in your state join the Poker Player's Alliance.