Bingo, casino and jogo do bicho lobbies are not the best company to be with, but we should try to maintain some consistency. I don't see how the argument of individual autonomy can be used to defend the right to use drugs, abort or submit to euthanasia, but not extend it to those who want to spend the money they earn honestly in slot machines or roulette. What we are basically discussing is less the content of each of these rights and more the limits of the State's power to regulate people's lives.
Be careful, I'm not defending a Bolsonarist version of freedom as the right to do everything nature allows us to do. Whenever the consequences of an action can cause concrete harm to third parties, the public power has the legitimacy to act. But when the deleterious effects primarily affect the person who made the choice, then freedom must be preserved, including the freedom to err. A didactic example is the combination of drugs (especially alcohol) with driving a vehicle. If the guy wants to stuff himself with cocaine, that's his right. But if he does, he cannot drive his car, as it would put pedestrians and other drivers and passengers at risk.
Of course, in the real world, people are much less autonomous than we would like (free will itself may be an illusion) and there is no action that, to some degree, however small, does not affect the whole community. Even so, I think we need institutions and rules that preserve the idea that everyone is responsible for their choices, or we would inaugurate the regime of guaranteed irresponsibility. I would say this is one of those necessary fictions.
At the end of the day, I think it's just a kind of silly moralism that makes us disapprove of the guy spending all his money on gambling, but we don't object when he gets the same result in the derivatives market.
Source: Folha de S.Paulo
