Learn More About Talking with Children About Gambling

By Dr. Panayiotis Papadakis

Children cannot be left on their own to learn the facts about gambling. It is our duty as parents to teach our children all there is to know about gambling and how it can secure a future and financial independence.

The single most important thing about children is that the younger the child is, the easier it is to teach him/her skills that he/she will use in the future, throughout his/her adult life.

Many parents don't realize that children are the best gamblers.

Not only are children the best subjects for beginner's luck but children will also bet any amount of money without any fear ar second thoughts. Let me tell you a true story.

When I was 18 my father opened up a new Greek diner. On that opening night he closed the register with a small profit and then decided to treat me for my 18th birthday. So, he put half of his night's earnings into my pocket and took me to a gambling den in Chinatown. His decision was based on the fact that I told him about the Martingale system, some 11 years ago, when I learned about it on my first day in school, from some older kid that had already been gambling for two years. Unlike my parents, his parents gave their child a proper gambling education and he was abel to learn from an early age hoe to make money. So, on my 18th birthday by father finally decided to take me gambling, partly to fulfil my childhood desire and partly to fulfil his own curiosity.

In about 2 hours of playing the Martingale system I amassed more than 10 times the amount of money that my father had made all night, on the eve of his "grand opening." At that moment I realized that I had wasted the first 18 years of my life reading books and studying for some exams that would never have any practical value in my future life. But the money I was holding in my hands had (to say the least) a real practical value.

On that night my father had also realized that he's been pursuing the wrong path his entire life. His years of ignorance cost our family dearly in money that could have been made. He struggles with his diner business for another couple of months, while I was running a gambling den in the basement. But soon my father came to his senses and let me convert the "old" diner into a full fledged casino. More of this story on the NCIG history page.

My family learned form their own mistakes. The good news is that many other families can learn form our mistakes, instead of letting the best years of their children's lives slip by, buried in books and school papers.

At the present time our school systems don't offer any gambling education at all. This subject seems to be too controversial for the narrow minded conservatives that make decisions about our children's futures - your children's futures. But responsible parenting is not about following a set of conservative rules imposed upon the masses by widely accepted society standards. Parents can talk to their children about gambling, in the privacy of their own homes and educate their future generations about the world's second oldest profession, which is gambling.

Furthermore, while grandpa may not even know how to turn on a computer, our children learn how to work with computers at an early age. In the privacy of your own home you can set up an account with any of the web sites that offer online gambling and let your children do something useful when they come back from school.

The most important thing is to stat early. Skills learned in childhood stay with the person forever.