The online world makes it harder than ever to protect people from themselves
One of the most controversial issues for society is to what extent certain activities such as gambling and others should be banned, given their demonstrably harmful effects on people prone to addiction.
Gambling is enormously difficult to regulate and subject to infinite variations from country to country and territory to territory. The main reason is that it involves finding the balance between the rights of individuals to do certain things that in themselves are not necessarily harmful, and society’s desire to protect them from themselves. Those in favor of protecting individual freedoms tend to view laws restricting such activities as interference, while those who suffer the effects of the addictions they trigger tend to demand more protection.
China has just cracked down on online gambling activities, banning practices that encourage people to bet heavily or spend more time on sites, imposing limits on spending per person, prohibiting user incentives for logging on more frequently, or duels between players that encourage higher spending.
The ban has hit the share price of gambling site hosts Tencent and NetEase. Going after online gambling is important, because there are few social barriers and brakes to gambling, which creates a largely hidden but nonetheless…
