The game of poker is a complicated one. The terminology alone can confuse even the quickest of learners. There’s the flop, the river, the turn, the blinds and the acts of calling, checking, and bluffing. In addition there are about a million different ways to play poker. A simple starting point: the number 1326. There are 1326 different hands that can be made up in a game of Texas Hold ’em the version of poker sweeping the nation, and now Guilford College.
In Texas Hold ’em, the concept is simple enough so that anyone can catch on after watching a hand or two, but tricky enough to insist that a certain level of skill be present in a winner. There are two hidden cards held by each player and five shared by the entire table. The stakes can be high or low, and the winning combination of cards wins the pot.
The year 2004 was a big year for poker. ESPN ran countless episodes of “World Series of Poker” and there was even a reality show created by Bravo called “Celebrity Poker Showdown.” The latest of these series’ is called “Tilt” and it is a drama on the world of Vegas-style heavy hitters. The appeal of shows like these is the notion that big wagers always yield big successes.
In The World Series of Poker the best of the best would come and risk hundreds of thousands of dollars on the cards they were holding, and some would walk away very wealthy. On Celebrity Poker Showdown the excitement was in spotting a favorite superstar bluffing or coming out ahead on a nice hand.
With Hold ’em’s growing popularity many people simply can’t wait for that golden opportunity when they have enough friends together to play as a group. The solution for these people is the online fix called “Party Poker.” At any given time, day or night, you can find up to nine other people just as amped as you are to play. If the risk isn’t worth it for you, there’s always the option to play for points instead of money, satisfying your need for a gamble and keeping your funds available. These rooms are called “play money” rooms.
So why is it that gambling is so appealing to so many young people all of a sudden? Assistant Professor of Psychology Eva Lawrence has answers. “Gambling is set up on a variable system of reinforcement that contributes to persistent gambling behavior. Gambling is unpredictable and you never really know when the payoff is coming,” she notes. Others, such as recent UNC Chapel Hill graduate Brian Prout feel that the game involves just as much skill as luck. He remarks, “A combination of the two is crucial to win big.”
Many Guilford students gather on a weekly basis to play their own tournaments. Usually around 8 or 9 o’clock 8 to 10 people get together for a game with only a 5-dollar buy-in. A buy-in means how much everyone is willing to start with; the money is first converted to chips of varying values. The winner of these games takes all the money used to buy-in up to 40 dollars worth. The rest of the pot goes to second place. Participants range from first-years to seniors. All are welcome.
But is everyone may not be ok with gambling taking place on a Quaker campus While a 5-dollar buy-in doesn’t hurt anyone too badly, the Guilfordian asked Head of Campus Ministries and long-time Quaker Max Carter. “Friends do have a testimony historically against games of chance, idle pursuits that impede the spiritual and intellectual life, and anything that leads to the formation of an addiction in a person,” he says.
Lawrence notes, “The point at which something becomes an addiction is generally determined by the amount of harm done to the person or to others.”
To this, Carter responds, “I have no great concern about the poker phenomenon IF gambling is not involved.”
He does not object if “it is community building, and non-exclusive, and it is not becoming an obsession to the point of detracting from study, physical exercise, and supporting other community-wide events.