Making Minorities: Cultural Space,Stigma Transformation Frames,and the Categorical Status Claims of Deaf,Gay, and White Supremacist Activists in Late Twentieth Century America

This article compares the efforts of movement activists in three dissimilar groups to replace a stigmatized status with a valued one by portraying their groups as resembling established minorities (claims of contiguity in cultural space) and as differing from groups stigmatized as deviant (claims of distance). The most common claims assert similarity to African Americans, and frequently incorporate civil rights themes (exemplifying frame diffusion). Tactically, these minority status claims exploit both the resonance of cultural pluralism and state recognition of minorities. Strategically, minority status framing enables stigmatized groups to claim legitimacy without changing — simultaneously asserting both normality and difference.     

The roots,significance, value and legislation of gambling

In this highly personal account, Reverend Moody traces his exploration for over three decades of many facets of the underlying nature of gambling in society and in human nature. He makes the case that much of the appeal of gambling comes from the excitement of playing with chance, and discusses how different types of gambling — lotteries, wagering, and continuous betting — meet a variety of needs and pose diverse levels of risk to gamblers. He notes distinctions between controlled and uncontrolled gamblers, and the tendency for controlled gamblers to play on the edge and risk loss of control. He notes difficulties in preventing the excesses that can occur to individuals who gamble. He points out the problems with legislatures legalizing gambling for ulterior purposes, such as to raise tax revenue, rather than to cater to the demand for gambling from punters. This can lead to situations where commercial gaming interests are not directed to act in the best interests of the general public because potential problems that may arise with available gambling are ignored or deemphasized. Finally, he points out the tensions amongst various interest groups who deal with gambling and notes those forums which have evolved in recent years that provide greater opportunities for dialogue among the various entities who deal with gambling and public policy issues.Gordon Moody was ordained a Minister of the Methodist Church in 1942. In recognition of his work on gambling, he was awarded the M.B.E. (Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) by the Queen in 1969. In 1980, the Open University conferred on him the Honorary Degree of Master of Arts. (See obituary, pp. 3–7). This issue is dedicated to his memory.     

Minimal treatments and problem gamblers: A preliminary investigation

In view of the increasing popularity of minimal intervention treatments for problem drinking, a self-help manual for people who wish to reduce or stop gambling was prepared. Twenty-nine (ACT residents) who responded to advertisements for help with problem gambling were allocated to either of two minimal treatments, Manual (only) and Manual & Interview. On average, clients from both groups reduced the frequency of their gambling sessions, frequency of overspending, and amount spent per week in the first three months and next three months after first contact, but expenditure per session increased from three to six months, after an initial improvement. There was no evidence that a single in-depth interview added to the effectiveness of the manual.This project was funded by a grant from the Australian National University Faculties Research Fund.     

Gambling swindles and victims

This article focuses on clever confidence schemes designed for gambling swindles. Victims of these schemes are sought out for their character and investment potential by con men working together. The big con schemes involve considerable planning and time in order to beat a carefully selected, wealthy victim; perhaps in a simulated casino setting. In contrast, the short con scheme may be carried out by a team or mob using a suburban street corner, or at a traveling carnival. Gaffed (rigged) game equipment may be used along with proven methods, and a well-rehearsed story or pitch by the operators.Until his recent retirement, Robert J. Snyder served as a career law enforcement officer for one of the largest policing agencies in the United States. The focus of his career was on gaming and gambling, especially carnival games and confidence schemes.Mr. Snyder also participates in training law enforcement officers and in providing expert witness testimony for court proceed ings on carnival and gambling confidence schemes. He currently heads Bob Snyder and Associates, Inc., a consulting firm based in Los Angeles, specializing in Gaming/Gambling issues for governmental agencies and private industry.     

Building a National Lottery: reviewing British experience

The launch of the United Kingdom's National Lottery at the end of 1994, was one of the most significant developments in both the funding of Britain's cultural sector and the British gambling sector since 1946. Thus in the 1995 financial year National Lottery ticket sales exceeded £5 billion of which 28% went to five specified good causes. This paper presents an overview of the National Lottery's launch and growth to date using published material and data. The lottery's establishment and regulatory regime are discussed, together with its impact in terms of both economic activity and the wider betting and gaming market within the UK. The National Lottery is then considered within the broader international context, and the incoming Labour Government's restructuring plans aimed at creating a People's Lottery are discussed. Thus the paper provides an overview of the development of a major new national institution.     

The relationship between dissociative-like experiences and sensation seeking among social and problem gamblers

The present study examined the relationships between dissociative experiences, sensation seeking scores, and gambling behavior. On the basis of the frequency of their gambling behavior and responses to the Gamblers Anonymous Twenty Questions, subjects were designated as either problem gamblers (N=30) or social gamblers (N=30).Those designated as problem gamblers responded yes to an average of 12.17 questions on the Gamblers Anonymous Twenty Questions as compared to the social gamblers who averaged 1.90 yes responses. Responses on the Twenty Questions correlated strongly with the frequency of gambling behavior and dissociative experiences. Problem gamblers reported a significantly greater number of dissociative experiences than social gamblers (p<.01). Problem gamblers scored significantly higher than social gamblers on the Total Sensation Seeking Scale, and the Boredom Susceptibility, Experience Seeking, and Disinhibition subscales. Clinical implications and recommendations for future research are discussed.     

Compulsive gambling in Britain

In 1968 England legalized casino gaming. Unlike their counterparts in America, legislators in the House of Lords actively debated ways to help compulsive gamblers. Parliament adopted the 48 hour rule, requiring players to wait two days before gambling, put severe restrictions on check cashing in casinos and, limited the number of slot machines to two per club. England considered, but rejected, other proposals: the method, used in France, of allowing compulsive gamblers to voluntarily put their names on a list of persons to be excluded and, complete prohibitions on casino credit. Although the legislative restrictions greatly reduced compulsive gambling among adult gamers; sadly, Parliament ignored what has become a growing source of compulsive gambling among children: the practically unlimited availability of public arcades with amusement machines paying small cash prizes.The author wishes to thank James Claber for assistance in this article.     

Touristic authenticity,touristic angst,and modern reality

The tourist has become the symbol of a peculiarly modern type of inauthenticity. This paper explores the criticisms that have been directed at the reality experiences of the tourist. In so doing, the following inexhaustive typology of touristic realities is developed: 1) the first-order or true tourist, 2) the second-order or Angst-ridden tourist, 3( the third-order or anthropological tourist, and 4) the fourth-order or spiritual tourist. Each of these types represents a progressively more intense search for reality through travel. Each is, however, criticized for participating in its own form of inauthenticity.After exploring the reality experiences and criticisms of each of these travellers, the paper turns the tables on the cultured despisers of tourism to argue that perhaps the lowly first-order tourist is not so inauthentic after all. True, this traveller may not be having a real heroic adventure, but such is not the goal. Rather, the reality experienced by the first-order tourist is a pleasurable liberation from the normal concerns of everyday life which simultaneously reaffirms commitment to that reality. Quite frequently the first-order tourist is less concerned about having a real experience in the visited place than in experiencing family and friendship relationships-relationships completely ignored by the anti-touristic tourists in their search for authenticity in someone else's reality.The author would like to thank Peter L. Berger, Harry C. Bredemeier, Warren I. Susman, and M. Kathy Kenyon for their comments and suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. This research was supported in part by NIMH grant no. 5 T32 NH14660.     

“Marrying off” children as a developmental stage

Conclusion Marrying off the children is an important developmental stage in adulthood. Part of the very long and complex stage described by Erik Erikson as Generativity vs. Stagnation, this stage, like many earlier life stages, can be understood to give rise to a normative adult crisis that is destabilizing and anxiety-provoking. The marriage of one's offspring requires an ongoing transformation of parental narcissism, part of a developmental process that is intrinsic to parenthood. Issues of selfesteem are revived and reworked during this period. Traditional theory looks to oedipal rivalry or drive conflict of some kind to explain the anxiety at this time. An expanded understanding of narcissism, provided by Kohut and Elson has given us a broader view of these phenomena.The experience of hurt and sadness at a time when there is reason to celebrate can be a profoundly lonely and bewildering experience. As informed clinicians we can alleviate some of the loneliness and guilt about these feelings by understanding the challenge to the self that the marriage of adult children may represent.     

Treating Problem Gamblers: Working towards Empirically Supported Treatment

There is an urgent need for mental health professionals to develop effective treatments for pathological gambling. A scientific meeting was held in Quebec City in June 2002 where 13 specialists in the treatment of gamblers pursued the objectives of making the State of the art statement concerning the procedures and the methodology to be used in future treatment outcome studies. This paper introduces this special issue of the Journal of Gambling Studies and identifies some of the key issues that confront clinicians and researchers interested in evidence based treatment for gambling related disorders.     

A Comparison of Hispanic and Anglo Calls to a Gambling Help Hotline

Prevalence studies have found that problem gamblers tend to be non-Caucasians. Nevertheless, information on non-Caucasian gambling patterns and problems is virtually non-existent. Data collected during years 1992–1998 on Hispanic (N = 209) and Anglo (N = 5311) problem gamblers calling the Florida Council on Compulsive Gambling Hotline for help is examined to provide information on one such non-Caucasian group: Hispanics. A sharp difference in the number of Hispanic and Anglo callers was found during this six year period (3.8% Hispanic and 96.2% Anglo). Differences were also found in the likelihood of Hispanics calling about their own problems, having gone for previous help, and types of gambling activities. Similarities were found between the two groups regarding age, marital status, and the three most cited problems caused by gambling: problems with family, inability to pay bills and going into debt. Anglos were significantly more likely to engage in illegal activities for gambling money and problems with job. Group differences caution against using Anglo based prevention and treatment programs with Hispanics populations.     

The social construction of the medical malpractice crisis: A case study of Massachusetts physicians

This study used observations from the 1985 Massachusetts malpractice insurance rate hearings, semistructured interviews conducted in 1985–1986, a survey of Massachusetts physicians in February 1988, and newspaper reports from theBoston Globe. Physicians and the Massachusetts Medical Society have promoted the medical malpractice crisis as an economic one. The after-expense income of most physicians, however, has remained relatively constant. The more serious threat to physicians appears to be the reduction of their autonomy. It is concluded that the medical malpractice crisis has been socially constructed in economic rather than autonomy terms because, traditionally, economics has been a more acceptable basis for labor unrest in the United States. Constructing malpractice as an economic crisis presents a more viable argument for stemming social change adverse to the medical profession.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 57th annual meeting of the Eastern Sociological Society, May 1987, Boston, Massachusetts.     

The Paradoxes of Modernity: Scientific Advances,Environmental Problems,and Risks to the Social Fabric?

Recent reviews have contrasted U.S. sociologists' empirical work on technological risks with the theoretical risk work of Giddens and Beck, but the reality is more complex. Most U.S. sociologists are less likely than Giddens or Beck to see risks as transcending socioeconomic and other divisions, but the United States–based work tends to interpret the trustworthiness of scientific–technical expertise in ways that lie between the arguments of Beck and Giddens. An examination of early nuclear technologies indicates that the United States–based perspectives provide a better fit, for theoretical as well as empirical reasons. The development of nuclear technologies was mixed, rather than high or low, in its competence and trustworthiness, and it created social and environmental risks that did not so much transcend social divisions as to reinforce them.     

“Lost Childhood”—Lessons from the Holocaust: Implications for Adult Adjustment

This paper was written in memoriam to the one and a half million children murdered during the Holocaust; in celebration of the tiny percentage who survived; in honor of their rescuers, the Righteous Christians and in meeting our own responsibility as survivors to bear witness.     

The future of gambling research—Learning from the lessons of alcoholism

Some common elements in the development of the illness models of alcoholism and pathological gambling are traced. It is argued that despite strong historical parallels the gambling research literature has avoided the destructive polemics that have surrounded the erosion of the medical model of alcoholism. None-the-less it is concluded that future research into gambling will benefit from following the recent alcohol research developments particularly with regard to studying excessive gambling, not in isolated clinical populations, but in the cultural, social and legal context of all who gamble.Acknowledgement: to those doing research into alcohol, especially Ray Hodgson, Jim Orford and Howard Rankin who have encouraged me to learn from their mistakes.     

Creating Accessible Queer Community: Intersections and Fractures with Dis/Ability Praxis

This article explores the intersections and fractures that disability theory and activism present to queer community. The authors begin by drawing upon a multiple axis approach from feminist theory, then discuss the problem of defining disability and queer. They then explore the intersections and fractures of these identities and theories, hoping to raise awareness among queer activists and scholars and introduce them to conceptual and practical tools. In particular, disability studies offers a way to reconceptualize and ground theory and practice in the messiness of real bodies and to make visible the mythic normate against which cultural Others are defined.     

The prevalence rates of pathological gambling: A look at methods

Planning the gambling environment requires protection of the public's health, safety and welfare. Whereas most public gaming provisions and statutes address the public's fears of organized crime as well as some welfare needs, rarely do they safeguard the public's health regarding the spread of the mental disease known as pathological gambling. Measurement of the prevalence and incidence of this disease would enable policy planners to evaluate both the state's responsibility for an epidemic and the adequacy of publicly funded treatment programs. The purpose of this paper is to examine the methods which underlie three different estimates of the prevalence rate of pathological gambling and to critique them in the light of sound epidemiological procedure. In 1975, the Institute for Social Research (ISR) of the University of Michigan conducted a national survey and a survey of the state of Nevada on behalf of the U.S. Commission on a National Policy Toward Gambling. Using discriminant function analysis coupled with subjective inspection of cases in the at-risk pool, the researchers estimated rates of probable and potential pathological gamblers. In 1984 and 1985, this author surveyed residents in the Delaware Valley and the state of Ohio using the cumulative clinical signs method which also posited rates of probable and potential pathological gamblers. In 1986, researchers at the Office of Mental Health for the State of New York employed a formal screening device to survey residents and proposed a rate of probable pathological gamblers and a rate of problem — although not pathological — gamblers. All three approaches produced different estimates. The utility of prevalence and incidence rate research in this field is threatened by a lack of consensus about the proper epidemiological procedure to be employed in arriving at these estimates. There is also confusion about the distinction between a probable and a potential pathological gambler. The planning purpose, method, validity and reliability of prevalence rate research about pathological gambling are addressed in this paper.     

A Twin Study of Adult Gambling Behavior

A twin study explored the possible genetic influences on gambling behavior. Male monozygotic (MZ) twins (n = 42) revealed significantly greater similarity on gambling frequency associated with high-action games than male dizygotic (DZ) twins (n = 50). The heritability estimates for involvement in these types of games among males were moderate and significant. All MZ versus DZ comparisons among males for low-action games were nonsignificant, as were MZ versus DZ comparisons among females (n = 63) for both types of games. The findings suggest that genetic influences may be important in the origins of certain types of gambling by men.     

Addiction to fruit machines: A preliminary study among young males

Although most sources treat gambling as an adult phenomenon, adolescent gambling is more widespread than is generally recognized, and in some cases may even be pathological. This paper outlines a preliminary study of eight adolescents addicted to playing and gambling on coin-in-the-slot machines (more commonly known as fruit machines). Factors involved in the onset of fruit machine playing are examined along with their alternative gambling activities and associated problems. The role of skill and excitement components in persistent playing are also discussed.The author would like to thank the United Kingdom Economic and Social Research Council for funding this work through a research studentship.     

Child Care Work: Intimacy in the Shadows of Family-Life

This study analyzes the relationships between child care workers and the families of the children they serve. Because paid child care operates in the borderlands of family, many workers develop intimate relationships—both emotional and physical—with the children they care for and their families. Based on three and a half years of participant-observation fieldwork, and in-depth interviews with child care workers, the researcher examines how worker's subjective meanings are shaped through daily interactions, through organizational processes found in child care centers, and by the gendering of child care as women's work. The child care workers in this study saw themselves in family-like relationship with the families they served. This designation as like-moms and pseudo-parents also meant that workers continually engaged in emotional labor—managing the intimacy they experienced as caregivers against the expectations placed on them as workers.