Victorian MPs should spend some time in a pokies joint and see the machines’ corrosive influence, writes Catherine Deveny.

HERE’S a question for you. How would it harm our society if we eradicated gambling, and, in particular, poker machines? It wouldn’t. What would we lose? Nothing. If we banned pokies, people would find other things to do and the Government would find other things to tax.

And if the pokie addicts missed the feeling of losing money, they could just flush half their pension money or their pay cheque down the toilet every week. How can we live with ourselves and support a Government that is raking in $1 billion in toxic revenue from pokies? I can’t understand how we’ve let this happen. It’s dirty money. And it stinks.

An article in The Sunday Age, “Pokies scourge creates new criminal class” outlined yet again how poker machines are causing law-abiding citizens to turn to crime to feed gambling addiction. I was sickened for the thousandth time to be reminded of how people’s lives and families are being ripped apart by these evil, mindless, addictive one-finger bandits.

I woke today to a beautiful, glittery Melbourne day. The air was sweet and the sky was blue, I popped on a nice frock, fixed my hair, dropped the kids off at school and drove in to Crown Casino.

A mate said: “I work near Crown and see all the pensioners pile out of the tram on my way to work.”

“On your way to work? What time does Crown open?”

He looked at me as if I were an idiot. “It’s open 24 hours a day.”

As I drove into the car park, I was asked to pay for my parking up front. The cold, stark reality of this great monstrosity of greed and broken dreams is that some people, maybe many people, don’t have the cash to pay for their parking when they leave. Let alone their mortgage, groceries, petrol, bills, car payments or child care.

As I write this I am sitting in front of a poker machine called Cash Express. There are others, indeed 2500 others. I look around at the faces of the people on the other machines. No one looks happy. Pokies do not bring joy. How bad are these people’s lives and how fractured are their souls if sitting in front of a poker machine on a beautiful day at 10am is an escape?

What would these people be doing if they didn’t have access to the pokies? Watching telly? Lying in bed? Flicking through a mag? Would any of those pastimes be more valuable? Maybe not, but at least they’re cheaper. None of these people around me punching the pokies has walked in here today expecting to be a loser. Despite knowing that these machines are programmed to make losers of them, they each feel as if they’re the lucky one. They are mesmerised by the pretty lights, the dark ,windowless room and the electronic music. Their basic instincts have been manipulated by thousands of dollars of interior design, flashing lights and electronic music researched and proven to separate people at their weakest from their money. Their faces don’t look happy, beautiful or wealthy. Just sad.

Gambling is theft and deception. It’s manipulative, corrosive and it diminishes us all. How are the social misery and catastrophic outcomes that poker machines create worth the bucks they pull in? I challenge the Victorian Government to take an excursion to a pokies joint and spend a couple of hours watching the faces, finding out about the lives behind the faces and then explain to me how any amount of money is worth that kind of cynical revenue raising. Politicians are elected for their brains, education, imagination and experience, so how is raising revenue through pokies the best we can do?

Why don’t they just cut out the middleman and tax stupid people, gullible people, sad people, tragic people, addictive people and broken people? Because that is exactly what they’re doing. The other day I drove past a pub and a sign next to the entrance to the gaming room read, “Everyone’s a winner!” No, they’re not. A friend told me about one of her students who works at a suburban pokies venue. A man won $5000 and gave her and another girl $100 each. When he left later that evening the girls had more money than he did.

Judge Roland Williams said he didn’t see “any real civilised justification for (poker machines) other than a means of indirectly taxing the people who are too stupid to work out what they are doing”. I’m with him. I have trouble reconciling my strong sense of civil liberty with the overwhelming feeling that all poker machines should be piled up and detonated. We humans are weak and some people need to be protected from themselves. We’re pleasure-seeking machines programmed to a certain level and type of risk that gambling exploits. We think “It won’t happen to me”, despite the fact that sometimes it does.

Book Catherine for your next conference, panel or think tank

I can’t stop thinking about him. I’ve even had his face tattooed on the insides of my eyelids so I can see him the moment I wake up. I’m so obsessed with him I chant his name aloud without realising. “Lame, gay, churchy loser. Lame, gay, churchy loser. Lame, gay, churchy loser.” ”Sorry,” I said to the man in front of me in the supermarket queue who’d snapped me an odd look. “Not you. Tony Abbott.”

Tony Abbott’s daughter called him a ”lame, gay, churchy loser” – I’m quoting her. Tony Abbott’s daughter for PM! And AM. 24/7! On every station. What do we want? Tony Abbott’s daughter. When do we want her? Whenever she’s mouthy.

I need to make it clear that despite persistent rumours, sadly, there’s nothing between Tony and me. Sure, we sat side by side on Q and A. Me in the Tony Sandwich. Abbott to the left of me, Jones to the right. There was a magic moment just before we went to air when Jones said to Abbott: “Just warning you, Tony – last time Catherine was on, John Elliot was sitting in your seat and when we walked off set, he pinched her bum and she smacked him across the head. Hello. Welcome to Q and A, I’m Tony Jones. Joining us on the panel this evening … ”

The frisson between Tony and me began when I called him a ”flappy-eared pope muncher”. And increased when I told him his white T-shirt under a white shirt made him look like a horny Mormon. The chemistry built when we were discussing abortion and I said: “Get your rosaries off my ovaries” and when he said: “Calm down, Catherine”, I replied: “Don’t tell me to calm down, you fire up.”

Is it hot in here or is it just me? It certainly isn’t global warming. Just ask Tony. The climate-change sceptic poster boy. In budgie smugglers. Not because it’s hot – because he’s hot. Don’t mind me while I lie back and think of the Vatican.

I love Tony Abbott. There. I’ve said it. And who wouldn’t? He’s a man who tells it like it is. In 1970. Not only does Big Tony believe in God, the monarchy, fault-based divorce and controlling women’s bodies (NOTE TO SELF: must ask him about guns, David Irving and Nostradamus), Big Tony also believes in The Tooth Fairy, Santa and Donald Trump’s hair.

But surprisingly denies the existence of Malcolm Turnbull.

Politics hasn’t been so invigorating since Mark Latham. Who knew the demise of the planet could be so entertaining? Or more specifically a white guy in a suit. The journalists’ faces when Big Tony came out after he’d been elected leader? The crowd went mild! Why would you want to lead the Liberal party? It’s like claiming ownership of a fart. Tony Abbott has done the impossible: made me feel sorry for a merchant banker.

Has he smoked dope? He gave it a red-hot go. But the inhale wasn’t successful. But he did, he revealed, have a lassi in India that was the ”house specialty” and it turned out to be hemp yoghurt. He was apparently ”away with the fairies” for a good 12 hours. I have a vision of him cleaning out a deep freeze with his tongue. Wearing a mitre. In the nude. While listening to the soundtrack of Jesus Christ Superstar.

Abbott is an early Christmas present for comedians and people  everywhere who don’t believe in science.

And he’s the gift that keeps on giving: amateur firefighter, ex-seminarian, lifeguard, mad monk, Lycra lout, Queen fancier, flirt and potty mouth. He’s part-man, part-ventriloquist dummy.

He may be a gay, lame, churchy loser. But he’s our lame, gay, churchy loser.

You know what? I’m voting Liberal in the next election if he’s still leader. And when I say leader, I mean patsy. Pump up the global warming and pass me a martini. I’m enjoying the show.

AM I the only person terrified by everything getting so big? Is anyone else feeling that the bigger things get, the more soulless they are becoming? McMansions furnishing each newborn with their own room and ensuite. People-movers providing every passenger with their own seat and personal air-conditioning settings. Buckets of popcorn larger than a human head flavoured not with butter but with butter flavouring.

Families eating around a wide-screen TV the size of a dining table. Mega-meal deals devoid of nutrition complete with a stuffed cheese crust, chocolate Bavarian and 1.25 litres of fizzy emptiness to wash it down. Shopping centres so massive it can take more than an hour to find your way back to your car. And as for coffee, once it was, “Sugar and milk?” These days not only is there a dazzling array of sexed-up artificial flavours but we have the choice of jug, bucket or trough. A simple cup of coffee is no longer enough. We want more.

If bigger was better I’d be thrilled for us. I’d be dancing in the streets wearing a T-shirt saying, “SUPER-SIZING IS YOUR TICKET TO SPIRITUAL AWARENESS AND INNER HAPPINESS”. But it’s not. The bigger things get, the smaller we are becoming.

The more we have, the less we’re enjoying it. The hole just gets bigger and that button inside us never turns off, no matter what we buy it, feed it or stuff it with. Obesity is soaring and depression is an epidemic. We’re knee deep in mortgage stress, debt slavery and the time poor. And the water is rising.

Abundance takes the value from everything. Nothing seems special any more. And we can’t help ourselves because we’re just mammals programmed to binge in times of plenty. Going to one of those all-you-can-eat places makes me feel sick. Eat more. It’s cheap. We’ve got heaps! This food means nothing. Pile up your plate. You deserve it. You’ve paid for it. The more you eat, the more value you’ll get.

You go from feeling empty to feeling stuffed, empty and sick. It’s a false economy. And it’s not making us happy. We don’t know what it feels like to be sated any more. We have two settings. Empty or overdosed.

Costco has now been open for two years. That sentence seems benign enough until you realise what Costco it. It’s an American chain of warehouse clubs. I hear you ask, what’s a warehouse club? Well, it’s a massive supermarket where you buy things in bulk.

Cheap. Very cheap. You pay a yearly fee of about $50 to be a member and because you’ve paid you feel compelled to drive out, stock up and get your money’s worth.

When I say bulk I’m talking “One-kilogram packets of potato chips … toilet rolls in packs of 36. Listerine in three-litre packs. Laundry detergent in nine-kilogram boxes … maple syrup by the gallon (3.8 litres) chocolate bars in packs of 30 … and dog food in 25-kilogram bags.” Items are displayed on pallets and the shopping trolleys are twice the usual size.

Don’t get conned by “it’s bulk and there are no plastic bags at the checkouts so it’s environmentally friendly”. It encourages a mentality of fear, famine and greed. It encourages people to consume more than they need. Eat three chocolate bars for the price of one. I’ve opened that kilogram bag of chips, so I may as well polish it off. We don’t need any more towels but they’re so cheap! Lets get 20. Because it’s cheap people feel they’re getting value for money. They’re not. It just means they’re eating more, spending more and feeling emptier. Instead of going to the local supermarket to buy what they need, they’re driving kilometres, taking 20 minutes to park and buying stuff they don’t need, because it’s cheap. And it’s there.

You may be thinking, “What’s she going on about? If people want to buy stuff to make them feel better, let ’em. We’re all going to die anyway. There’s more important stuff to write about: war, famine, poverty, the environment, the under-funded education system, overburdened health care …”

Can’t you see? All this gorging on abundance is destroying the environment, creating landfill and making us slaves to multinationals with “buying power”. It’s making us fat, sad and scared, which affects the cost of health care and leaves fewer resources for schools and aid. We’re getting stressed and sad and that impacts on our productivity, quality of life and happiness and that of those around us. And it’s corroding our souls.

Do what you like, buy what you like, drive what you like and shop where you like. But ask yourself if you are really getting value for money.

I’m glad the price of petrol is going up and the price of food is rising. It’s the only way that we’re going to stop, look around and realise what things are really costing us.

Apropos Miranda Devine’s column on Sunday about Labor Minister Penny Wong and her same-sex partner having a baby, heterosexuals being shamed into hiding their families, Devine speaking ‘as a Catholic’ as if it somehow legitimises crazy talk and how gay parents (via fatherlessness) are the cause of the London riots, (go with me) two words: Calm down. We need her.

If you are a conservative and/or a right-wing bigot you need Devine and people like her to massage your prejudices.

If you are a progressive you need her to voice the extreme beliefs of the other team to get your beliefs over the line. And if you are a progressive it’s in the best interest of your interests for the conservatives to feel lulled into a false sense of security with words like ‘decency’, ‘tradition’, ‘family values’ and ‘community morals’. Because the more the conservatives believe the majority of the world is with them living in the 1950s the louder they shout when the gays, feminists, atheists, greenies, asylum seekers, disabled, ethnics etc appear to be gaining recognition as human beings with equal rights. Or as right-wing bigots say “stealing or jobs, marrying our women, pinching our parking spots and taking over the world”.

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