Sunday Session Newsletter Ep. 4

You never could blow up the pokies.

Forewarning: The following newsletter contains confronting topics. If this is not the right time for you to be reading this, please click away. The opinions should not be considered as fact and Sober Standard is not bound by any of the wording throughout.

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I was updating our “charter” recently after meeting with some potential financial backers for Sober Standard when I realised it has become somewhat of a brain dump. That was when I began to get strangely angry.

As humans do now that we live in the online world, I realised I hadn’t circled back to why I wanted to start Sober Standard—what really got me invested in this in the first place. I’ll show you what I had in my notes (not in the charter) below:

• Fake sobriety stories. I cannot stand the publicising of fake sobriety stories for clicks. I have been putting together a series of interviews lately, my goal is to make them more like Complex’s Blueprint rather than a celebrity spilling the beans on their alleged junkie friend whom they just “can’t save” (introducing Steve-O again…). This doesn’t help anyone.

But the anger wasn’t coming from there. So, what else did I have?

• Accountability-led sobriety. I grew up in the era of what I affectionately call “Pre-Drunk Punk,” where the punk music I loved was anti-establishment and pro-clean living. I wanted that to be my beacon, because selfishly, this lifestyle and ideology worked for me.

Once again, that wasn’t it. No, it was something that had been lingering in the back of my head for weeks (call me crazy, fine), and it was a comment online.

This comment, which may seem innocent enough appeared on a message board from the Facebook group Kickin The Punt. The post was from a relative of the man featured in the (what seems to be somewhat suppressed) documentary Our stories, our truth – The suicide of Gary Van Duinen. According to the documentary Gary Van Duinen alledgedly took his own life in 2018 because of a poker machine addiction. Those who don’t know “pokies” should understand they litter almost every pub and drinking establishment across Australia—also throughout the RSLs (Returned & Services League) across the country, which are intended for veterans.

In a country like Australia you can’t even question these organisations. Drinking and Gambling go hand in hand in Australia, rarely is there one without the other.

In another time, I interviewed one of the co-founders of Kickin the Punt, who was a fierce supporter of accountability-based action, but the industry pushback their initiative received was tough for a small group to manage. In a country like Australia, you can’t even question these organisations.

Sadly Gary’s story is not an isolated one and many that sing what was a huge hit ‘Blow Up the Pokies’ by the Whitlams don’t realise this was a very true and personal story for the band. All the while thousands probably sing along and then head to the pub straight after not knowing that it’s the source of the song’s pain.

Andrew Joseph Lewis (16 June 1966 – 12 February 2000) was the original bassist of Australian band The Whitlams.^[1] He first played in Canberra, Australia in a duo called In Limbo, playing Everly Brothers and other songs from the 1950s and 60s with two acoustic guitars and close harmonies. In October 1985, he joined Canberra band, The Plunderers, on keyboards, guitar and harmony vocals.^[2] He left The Plunderers in April 1987, leaving a small legacy of recordings with the band, most noticeably a version of The Velvet Underground’s “Stephanie Says” and the original version of Stevie Plunder‘s “Where Are You?”. In 1992, he formed The Whitlams but left them in late 1995, and went to Melbourne to join The Gadflys. He battled a gambling addiction and committed suicide in February 2000, aged 33,^[3] after losing an entire week’s pay in a poker machine.

“Blow Up the Pokies“, co-written by Tim Freedman (The Whitlams) not long before Lewis’ death, is a comment on the destruction that Freedman saw in Lewis’ life because of his gambling. It was awaiting release as a single at the time. Freedman soon after wrote “The Curse Stops Here”, a song describing being the “last one” from the original line-up of The Whitlams, and voicing his determination to survive.

They are still taking the food off the table.

Australia has over 185,000 poker machines—one of the highest concentrations of pokies per capita anywhere in the world. Australians lose an estimated $13–16 billion AUD on poker machines every year alone, with total gambling losses across pokies, sports betting, casinos, racing, and online gambling exceeding $30 billion annually.

On a per-person basis, Australians lose more money to gambling than almost any other country on Earth, making Australia one of the world’s most heavily gambling-dependent societies. What has been normalised as “entertainment” has become an industrial-scale addiction economy, extracting billions from Australian communities every year.

In Australia, parliamentary and research bodies have also found:

• Gambling harm is linked to a roughly 4x higher suicide risk.
• “Almost one in five people presenting with suicidality also experience harm from gambling.”

And yet, there is silence. Australians lose over $30 billion every year to gambling, while governments collect an estimated $6–7 billion in gambling tax revenue from those losses. Australia has built one of the most gambling-dependent economies in the world, where addiction has become a major source of public income.

Now, across the world—particularly in America—we have the likes of DraftKings, Polymarket, and other ways for us to gamble wherever we are. If anything, this has only worsened. Apparently, both the US and Australia spend roughly $150–300 million annually on “harm awareness” campaigns and support… yet they are pocketing billions while the strain on the community runs deep. Suicide, sickness, criminal activity—the list goes on. Make it make sense, please.

So back to the anger. Allow me to retort: Nothing is working, and nothing has worked. Fake support systems have failed, and fake messaging has failed because the dollars are simply too big. As I scrolled through the comments on a page littered with those who have lost their lives to this issue, I realised this is why I want Sober Standard to succeed—because very little else has.

Even though I don’t consider Australia my home so much anymore, I am still passionate about the pain these absolute machine devils cause, and I know they have no place in any establishment.

Oh and the charter…. Should it just be Blow Up the Pokies on repeat because damn, doesn’t hit home for an addict.

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Blow Up the Pokies

Song by The Whitlams ‧ 1999

Lyrics

There was the stage
Two red lights and a dodgy P.A.
You trod the planks way back then
And it’s strange that you’re here again, here again
And I wish I, wish I knew the right words
To make you feel better, walk out of this place
And defeat them in your secret battle
Show them you can be your own man again
Don’t, don’t explain
Lots of little victories take on the pain
It takes so long to earn
You can double up or you can burn, you can burn
And I wish I, wish I knew the right words
To make you feel better, walk out of this place
And defeat them in your secret battle
Show them you can be your own man again

And I wish I, wish I knew the right words
To blow up the pokies and drag them away
‘Cause they’re taking the food off your table
So they can say that the trains run on time
Flashing lights, it’s a real show
And your wife? I wouldn’t go home
The little bundles need care
And you can’t be a father there, father there
And I wish I, wish I knew the right words
To make you feel better, walk out of this place
And defeat them in your secret battle
Show them you can be your own man again
Show them you can be your own man again
And I wish I, wish I knew the right words
To blow up the pokies and drag them away
‘Cause they’re taking the food off your table
So they can say that the trains run on time
Another man there was made the trains run on time

***If you’re hurting, you are never alone. You are loved. The Future is bright.

**If you like this newsletter what we’d love is if you share it and support the groups that support us. Also comment below and we’ll try to respond to each one.

*You may be wondering what “Kickin the Punt” means; in Australia, the word “punt” is a reference to gambling (“I’m going for a punt”), and the group is essentially named after kicking the habit.