Pokie Ban Near Social Housing: Ugly Prejudice Or Blessed Nanny State?

A long row of slot machines glow in a darkened gaming room
Casino photo by Christopher Irwin is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

Apparently the poor (particularly those living in social housing) cannot control themselves when it comes to pokies, unlike “normal” people, who apparently can. Otherwise the Wyndham, Western Australia council would be banning pokies near any housing at all.

So are we facing one of those ingrained prejudices against the poor in general and social housing in particular — the kind of knee-jerk prejudice that last year briefly turned Melbourne social housing into a fenced-off gulag1?

Well, there is at least one practical excuse that is more bureaucratic bean-counterism than prejudice. A person with limited income who cannot handle pokies may indeed cost the taxpayer as well as private individuals/companies should such persons pokie themselves into bankruptcy or eviction.

So, should we view the pokie ban near public housing as commendable initiative of a responsible nanny-state, or just one more social prejudice of the general population and its leaders — one that needs nipping in the bud?

Read more about a supposed pokies2 crisis peculiar to social housing residents in Wyndham’s Star Weekly: Pokies to be banned near social housing

Footnotes

  1. Read, for example, in SBSNews: Melbourne’s public housing lockdown was an ‘assault on human dignity’, says the UN’s former housing expert
  2. Wondering what pokies are? We Canadians certainly were. Pokies: . .or Poker Machines in Australia, Fruit Machines in the UK, Puggies in Scotland, Slots, or Slot Machines in North America. Also one-armed bandits.