• Chozo@fedia.io
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    11 hours ago

    That’s a whole lot of distraction from the point, mate. If you found out that a casino was allowing children to gamble on their property, would you not want to shut down that casino?

    Yes, the parents shouldn’t be allowing the kids to gamble. But parents don’t always “allow” their kids to do the things they do in the first place. You know damn well you did things as a child that you weren’t “allowed” to do, things that you were told specifically not to do. You know that you successfully hid things from your parents, but expect other parents to find everything? Most of this happens completely under the parents’ radar.

    Addicts steal, and that’s no different for children, either. Often they’ll take their parent’s credit card in hopes that the charge goes unnoticed, or they’ll obfuscate the charge by spending money on another currency that gets converted after the fact to one used for lootboxes.

    There are even worse things that an addict will do for money. Some may resort to scams; sometimes they’ll set up catfish social media profiles to bait gooners into paying them gobs of money for fake pictures. Some may resort to worse behavior; I’ve seen instructional TikTok videos for children to lure adults onto Roblox for sexual acts, to be paid in Robux, which can then easily be converted into just about any other game’s currency. Literal child prostitution.

    But sure. Let’s blame the parents, instead of the billionaire’s child casino.

    • imahappyguy@lemmy.world
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      10 hours ago

      I could not give a shit. I am a parent of two and no, you cannot watch them every second. But you can watch your bank accounts. You can watch your child play. You can watch your child’s behavior change if they start getting really into gambling.

      I had an older child I kinda took care of, who thinks of me as a father figure; he has none. He called me one night cause he was 16 and drunk and high and didn’t want to drive home. He said, "I called you, because you always said to call you if this happened. I’m so sorry“. I picked him up and helped his hangover the next morning and we had a long talk. That kid is on the ocean sending underwater robots to explore as an electrical engineer. Cause he liked that I did that. EE, not the water stuff lol.

      Parents are responsible for their children and children have to learn responsibility for their actions. And that is a lesson that you have to teach your children. The best way is through learning. I’ve watched my mom raise an addict, so don’t you fucking dare try to appeal to me. She was the perfect mom. He just got in with the wrong crowd and went downhill. He’s sober now, but it was rough growing up. But she put in a hell of a lot of work into him.

      I tell you that, because I’m not here to say we should ban public schools, because that’s where my brother tried heroin. I’m not here to say we should fund private schools with taxpayer money, because there are drugs in our schools. It’s a fucking bad stroke of luck. Fire and damnnation, this got me hot. Don’t fall off your pedestal as you get on your high horse.

      • Chozo@fedia.io
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        6 hours ago

        I could not give a shit.

        I can tell, since nothing else about your comment was at all related to what I was saying.

        • imahappyguy@lemmy.world
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          4 hours ago

          You’re right, I just gave you my personal experiences about parenting children. I even brought up my brother in recovery, distinctly because you brought up addicts. I still stand by it being a parental issue. Don’t have kids if you don’t want that responsibility. This kind of argument has the same vibes as, “we need age verification on websites”. No, we don’t. Parents need to be better. I’m a millennial parent and I know how the internet works. I also know that every app nowadays has parental controls built in. Moreso, I can specifically block things on the router. The tools are there. Just be a parent. How many children do you have?

          • Chozo@fedia.io
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            3 hours ago

            We’re really far from the point now.

            I’m a millennial parent and I know how the internet works. I also know that every app nowadays has parental controls built in. Moreso, I can specifically block things on the router.

            Remember how you found ways to circumvent those things in your youth without your parents knowing? Guess what? Kids still do that. Parental controls only work on children who lack creativity.

            You aren’t going to be there 100% of the time for your kids. No parent would be. It would be abusive to be present 100% of the time. You’re going to trust your kids with a certain level of autonomy, and they’re occasionally going to do things with that autonomy that you disapprove of; that’s an important part of growing up. Maybe it’s swearing, maybe it’s getting into fights, maybe it’s cheating on homework, or maybe it’s buying lootboxes. You can’t block everything.

            Nobody’s saying that you shouldn’t try to prevent your kids from falling into these traps. By all means, you should. But you shouldn’t expect to be successful 100% of the time. You’re going to slip. They’re going to slip. That’s life.

            However, the fucking CHILD CASINO still exists. Maybe you can keep your kids out of it, but there are still kids getting addicted to gambling because nobody is shutting down the child casino. The fact that it exists, at all, should be appalling to any parent; but instead, some of them are defending it because “ohh but they did some good things for Linux gaming”. Get real, my guy.

            • imahappyguy@lemmy.world
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              48 minutes ago

              You’re right, we are far from the point. At what step in the loot box/gambling process is money exchanged. Then tell me how gambling works. Then tell me if they are the same.

              • Chozo@fedia.io
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                20 minutes ago

                Holy shit, Gabe’s really got you by the balls, eh. We’ve reached the “actually lootboxes aren’t gambling” arc.

                Insane, the lengths some will go to defend shitty behavior from shitty billionaires.

                • imahappyguy@lemmy.world
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                  33 seconds ago

                  If it’s gambling, loot boxes should be items of value, redeemable for cash, correct? And Valve should be the one providing that cash, as they are the child casino, correct?

                  The fact that you aren’t answering is an answer in and of itself. You can reduce yourself to insults, but it only harms your arguement.

                  It is gambling, but only as much as Pokémon and Disney’s Lorcana. And that’s perfectly legal. You would need to go after those practices too. But I think you’d find a hard time with that. You know why? Cause it was dismissed in 1999 in New York v Nintendo of America. Gotta change the law for what you want, friend.