Sports betting needs to get away from me

I gave up reading books on futurism, because they were all convinced that algorithms know me better than they know myself, and one day they might, but today is not that day. We're not even close, and sometimes it feels like the algorithms that drive the few social channels and advertising recommendations I get thrust in front of me are aggressively running away from me. 

Because after three decades on the internet, and two decades of blogging and social media, I still keep getting served ads for sports betting, something I absolutely loathe with every fibre of my being. I've been yelling in the digital void for half my life long, and all I'm getting back is stuff I legitimately can't stand. How does that even work?

I'm not opposed to the concept of sports betting, one of the small pleasures in life is putting $20 down with your mate on a big game, giving it all a bit of spice, especially when the chances are the winner is just gonna buy beers for everybody anyway. 

But the corporate sucking up of this disposable income - promising massive riches through astronomical odds - does real harm with no goddamn benefit, and we've got enough of that in the world, right? There is a mountain of evidence that this shit does actual harm to people, but it's tolerated and encouraged, and I fucking hate it.

And yet, every second podcast I listen to thinks that this is something that I would be into, and throws it in my face in every inserted advertisement. 

I'm just not that into it. I'm just not a betting person,. We visited Vegas once and I bet $5 on a Star Wars slot machine at the airport on the way out, and that was as far as my gambling went (all that opulence, all clearly hoovered straight up out of the pockets of the marks who flocked for the cheap buffets).

The idea of targeted ads does have some appeal - maybe show me the books and movies and music I'm actually interested in buying, and might not know about. But no, instead I'm being told to constantly get my bet on, like all the other fucking rubes.