John Oliver Tackles Sports Betting in Final Episode

John Oliver discusses sports betting, how it became so popular, why it can be so damaging, and – of course – how toned John’s shoulders are. Very toned. According to him.

Gambling industry luminary Joe Brennan, Jr. wrote of the episode: "Canada PM Odds Shift Toward Liberals amid Trump BacklashYou’re nobody in this world until John Oliver has had a go at you. Sure, he stacks the deck with some shallow & conflated points, but you can have a laugh & want to do a better job with the betting industry at the same time."

Jessica Welman of SBC wasn't feeling it. "Made it 16 minutes into the John Oliver sports betting vid before I said "Okay that is objectively false", which is longer than I expected."

Other viewers chimed in.

"The segment slightly touched on it, but the thing that scares me the most is how many children are on these betting apps. I am a high school teacher and I have a sizable portion of my students talking about making sports bets on apps by having their parents make accounts for them and then letting them just run free. These kids are still developing mentally and are doing immense damage to themselves - damage that is going to be extremely difficult to deprogram when they are older. It is a huge problem and, like you stated, we are going to be looking back on these times asking ourselves 'What the hell were we thinking?'"

"I don’t know if anyone will see this but this piece kind of shook me up. I had this subtle itch telling me I might have a problem. Luckily I haven’t lost all that much money (I just looked and I’m in fact winning on the year) but hearing that the companies are actively trying to get me to “play to extinction” made something snap. I’ve got to stop before I leverage my family’s future. I went through all of my apps and suspended all my accounts. Thank you."

"Viewer from the Netherlands here. A few years back online gambling laws got relaxed. Advertisements became allowed, and immediately were EVERYWHERE. The industry was supposed to regulate itself with betting limits, etc. I shouldn't have to tell you how that worked out. Long story short, gambling addictions and debts spiked and it's surprisingly difficult to improve the situation."

"MLB/MiLB official scorer here. One of the signs that sports gambling had taken a quantum leap forward: a few years ago, we were given a new policy that any scoring change (usually hit vs. error) had to get recorded to MLB through the in-game technician (known as a "data stringer") BEFORE we make any such announcement over the P.A. system. The reason for this is that someone in the press box might be betting on the game. If we announce it first, a reporter/broadcaster/blogger can get a bet in before the ruling is submitted. Personally, I would prefer a no-gambling policy for anyone in the press box, but this was the more catch-all solution. Bear in mind, someone can lose their credential and earn a ban if they ask a player for an autograph or take any equipment from the venue. So there is certainly room for having similar policy for anyone covering the game not being allowed to place a bet. Nope, MLB preferred to impose this policy for the game's OS."