vegas wants asians

The New York Times has another article on Las Vegas casinos and their efforts to attract Asian gamblers: Las Vegas Caters to Asia's High Rollers. They've adopted increasingly aggressive strategies to woo Asian both domestically and abroad, aiming not only at the newly wealth from China, but also Asian Americans and other recent Asian immigrants. These efforts include redesigning large portions of a casino floor to cater to the tastes of Asians guests; advertisements written in Asian dialects and placed in community newspapers in nearby cities; and mailers written in a recipient's native language. None of this, of course, helps address the increasing high rate of gambling problems within the Asian community...

The vigor of their efforts is stirring the ire of some Asian activists and others. "If the casinos singled out African-Americans and marketed to them as heavily as they do Asians, I'd imagine there'd be this huge political outcry," said Timothy W. Fong, co-director of the Gambling Studies Program at the University of California, Los Angeles. "The marketing has been so aggressive, and the penetration so deep, we're starting to see alarming increases in the rates of problem gambling among Asians."

While gambling has arguably always been a big part of Asian cultures, this kind of marketing by casinos borders on exploitation, particularly when they're targeting less-affluent Asian American communities. Studies suggest higher rates of problem gambling among Asians than other groups. One long-term study under way in California suggests that Asians are three times as likely as other groups to develop a serious gambling problem. This is a real problem in our community, more than most are probably aware of, and it shouldn't be taken lightly.