A Vancouver resident called out a “gambling lobby group” handing out bags with cartoon storybooks, yo-yos, and bouncy toy dice as inappropriate after their child and nanny were approached at their local park.
According to the Vancouverite, they were approached around March 27 at Garden Park in East Vancouver, and the games that they were handing out were all suitable for preschool-aged children.
“The booklet they provided portrays a cartoon bear stealing a phone, compulsively gambling on it for a day and night (not eating or sleeping), and threatening violence against friends who try to intervene. This is not portrayed as extreme behaviour in the storybook, and the bear suffers no repercussions for this behaviour aside from having to return the phone,” the upset local (who declined to provide their name) told Vancouver Is Awesome in a message exchange on the Reddit platform. As for the dice: “This is simulating gambling to generate interest in the dice in the kids. What's the logic here?”
This isn’t a lobbyist group, but rather Gambling Support BC (GSBC) prevention providers who have come to the park to educate both children and parents on topics related to gambling like risk, decision making and communication.
“GSBC prevention providers offer a range of services, including education and awareness presentations, health promotion and community engagement activities to all demographics,” writes the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General in an email to V.I.A.
“Contracted prevention providers direct members of the public to [the Choices and Chances web resource] as well as Gambling Supports BC’s main program website,” adds the ministry. “These contractors often provide planned (and permitted when appropriate) presentations in schools or in public, which may include the dissemination of other program endorsed and age-appropriate materials.”
Choices and Chances is a web resource developed by GSBC and the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research (CISUR) which was launched in 2018 to address problem gambling and the stigma surrounding gambling and gambling addiction.
“The site is designed to be gambling neutral, meaning it is neither for or against gambling but operates on the understanding that gambling exists,” writes the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General.
The East Vancouver local thinks otherwise, sharing that “the website does attempt to provide some context and education on gambling and statistics, but seriously glosses over that in their approach... often using superlative language to describe the act of gambling.”
“If you told me that this whole thing was an attempt to indoctrinate children in a blue-collar neighbourhood to think of gambling as a perfectly normal and expected part of their life, I'd 100% believe it,” the Vancouverite says.
