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Middleboro Mashpee Wampanoag Resort Casino
Editorials by Hal Brown, Editor and Publisher

Some casino opponents have been likened to members of the Ku Klux Klan. Let's look at why.

5/8/08 (revised at 5PM) There is only one usage of the name "Ku Klux Klan" on this website. It was in the context of reference to an article about Citizens Equal Rights Alliance (CERA) which had that in its title.

This is the sentence that seems to have provoked an uproar:

She (Carol Kelly) belongs and is on the board of Citizens' Equal Rights Alliance (CERA) which has been identified by the anti-hate group organization Public Eye ( in a personal conversation), Indian Country Today (which calls it in a paper The Ku Klux Klan of Indian Country), and the Montana Human Rights Network as basically a hate group that slips under the radar because it claims to be pro-indian rights and against racism.

This has provide fodder for casino opponents to accuse me of playing the race card, suggesting the local oposition was like the the Klan, as well as the totally inaccurate charge that I was suggesting that any more than a handful of anti-casino residents may harbor racist sentiments. An assistant professor of journalism at Northeastern University named Dan Kennedy even took this sentence and wrote in his "Media Nation" blog: "This is surreal. Casino supporter Hal Brown, who has compared opponents to the Ku Klux Klan..." One, I didn't write about it I referenced an article, and two, if I had it would have been in about opponents who are members of CERA and not local casino oponents.

It is also my article, "A call for CasinoFacts to repudiate bigotry, prejudice and hate", that led to the allegation that I was trying to impugne the anti-casino movement by using what is a time tested political tactic (note Reverend Wright) of implying "guilt by association" on the CERA/Carol Kelly matter. The fact is that you can associate with someone, as leaders of CasinoFacts have with Carol Kelly, and not share all of their beliefs. There are times when it makes sense to say this.

Whether the Citizens Equal Rights Alliance is not, as it says on its website, a racist orgaization or has racist members is in dispute. What isn't in dispute is that they are against Native Americian sovereignty. Opposing this is their primary mission. Being against Indian gambling casinos on resevations, and fighting it when they can, appears to be secondary to their cause. It does, however, gain them allies who do not subscribe to their opinion about sovereignty.

When someone likens CERA to the KKK, as was done in the article CERA: The Ku Klux Klan of Indian Country, it is in regards to their oposition to Indian sovereignty.

These concerns could have been laid to rest this summer if only the leadership in the oposition had simply made a statement distancing themselves from anyone whose motivation for being against the casino may have been racist in nature. One sentence would have sufficed to close the book on this matter.

How can a pro-casino therapist care about people?

The other editorial, "Resort-casino supporters care about people too", makes my case that casino supporters are just as compassionate as those on the other side.

It expresses what I believe is a clear recognition, as I have in other articles, of the negatives of gambling. It is an attempt to answer the question as to why I support a casino.

My support of a casino has led to some attacking me. A few people posted anoymous insults on blogs. These come under the category of "sticks and stones will hurt my bones". However, and this is significant, I've been severely critcized as being someone who lacks compassion. This is a serious charge to make against anybody, let alone a psychotherapist whose life's work has been all about trying to alleviate people's suffering.

Here are the editorials

 

Resort - casino supporters care about people too.

7/21/07 An important, in fact probably the most important consideration Middleboro residents face as to whether the endorse a casino with their vote in the Town Meeting on July 28th is whether the negative social ramifications of having this facility here are outweighed by the benefits to the town. I believe the issue of a possible increase in crime has been adequately addressed. That leaves the sentiment, which I believe is sincere, expressed by Mark Belanger in today's Cape Cod Times and Standard Times. I will assume that he intended to comment on the effects of casino gambling in our town.


"I don't believe that any amount of money would make the social negatives worth having. I can't say that lowering my taxes by some amount of money is going to make it OK that some family is broken up, loses their house, has a divorce, a bankruptcy, a suicide... I cannot in good conscience say that any amount of money is worth that to me."

In order to provide a counter-point to this argument I first have to accept that indeed there will probably be instances where a family is broken up, where they loose their home, or a couple divorces, or there's a bankruptcy, or less likely but still possible, a suicide which one can directly attribute to the casino and compulsive gambling. For those people and their loved ones my argument may seem philosophical and worse, actuarial. I admit that it is, be please bear me out.

First, casinos don't cause compulsive gambling, with susceptible people they can push them over the edge but this is not a given. I don't think you will find a casino supporter who doesn't care about these people. There is no tried and true mitigation to prevent this. Oftentimes counseling comes too late. I have seen this as a therapist. Once someone is caught up in the random rewards cycle of compulsive gambling it is a very difficult pattern, one requiring deep motivation, to break. One of the best ideas I have heard since this issue came to the forefront is having those in treatment for compulsive gambling, whether in a support group like Gamblers Anonymous or group or individual psychotherapy, voluntarily sign an agreement not to enter the casino, which would be enforced by casino personnel.

Those whose gambling ended up in front of a judge could have both treatment and such an agreement mandated. My own experience treating three compulsive gamblers who only played scratch tickets was thwarted by my inability to keep them away from venues where the tickets were sold. As motivated as they were they couldn't resist the urge when they were in proximity to those colorful displays, each little ticket a mini-slot machine design beckoning "win - win - win".

I am not naive about the insidious and well planned lure of gambling to those with this psychiatric disorder.

The best treatment for compulsive gambling is not to require treatment at all: it s through education that has to start early in life.

Now to the philosophical - which is why I as a therapist can accept the consequences enumerated by Mark Belanger and other members of CasinoFacts, consequences of concern to all residents of Middleboro whether or not they support the casino.

For every negative listed I believe they will be so many positives, albeit in many or most cases effecting others who are or will suffer the same or similar consequences without the fiscal benefit the casino will provide.

Consider the schools. A better teacher to student ratio, and an adequate number of school counselors, social workers and psychologists, will be able to provide much more individual attention to student who show early signs of personal problems or struggling with family conflicts at home. Early intervention in the mental health field is always better intervention.

A well funded police force will not only be better able to deal with law enforcement, but will have more time to address juvenile delinquency which now starts in the pre-teen years.

The agreement with the tribe will provide $20,000 for some kind of compulsive gambling counseling. This may seem like a small amount except we won't know until the casino is open for a period of time how best to address problem gambling. This amount my be all that is needed to provide professional counseling for those without insurance or Medicaid.

CasinoFacts is sending a mailing out that says:

"This backroom deal has been orchestrated at high levels in an attempt to push a casino down our throats with fear and lies. We've been told over and over that this is good for our town, that we have no choice, that there's no stopping it, and that we have no vote."

Rhetoric about what sounds like what would be an illegal "backroom" deal, at least by the Selectmen, plays on people's paranoia about conspiracies. People can have their normal fears of being powerless to effect things which will have an impact on their lives manipulated. One only has to look at national politics and terrorism to see how this has been accomplished post 9-11.

Pro-casino people telling people that the casino may very well come here even if the town votes against it? This is hardly a lie. There's good reason to believe it will.

One of the tried and true methods of persuasion, unfortunately often successful, is to accuse your opponents of doing exactly what you are doing.

A call for CasinoFacts to repudiate bigotry, prejudice and hate.

7/21/07 The language about pushing a casino down our throats with fears and lies is inflammatory.

Fears of what? Child abuse and violent crime? This is a distortion if not outright prevarication.

Is it a scare tactic to imply that there's something wrong with our schools having working class people enroll their children who may speak a language other than English? They may be suggesting to some that we will have new residents who don't quite measure up to our middle class standards. It doesn't have to be spelled out for some bigoted and prejudiced people to read between the lines. Why else would pro-casino demonstrators have had two or three people shout racial epithets at them? If there are a few who feel that strongly, how many others of them are they that have had their underlying prejudices, based on unwarranted fears, played upon by CasinoFacts' material?

While we recognize that CasinoFacts.org can't control those who hold or espouse bigoted beliefs, we have yet to see an inequitable disavowal of them.

Do we want CERA in our town?

Another example of the need for disavowal regards how a board member, Carol Kelley (Plymouth, MA), of an organization self-identified as being against Indian sovereign rights, and considered an anti-Indian rights hate group, or worse, by other organizations, has interjected herself into the Midleboro debate on the anti-casino side. She belongs and is on the board of Citizens' Equal Rights Alliance (CERA) which has been identified by the anti-hate group organization Public Eye ( in a personal conversation), Indian Country Today (which calls it in a paper The Ku Klux Klan of Indian Country), and the Montana Human Rights Network as basically a hate group that slips under the radar because it claims to be pro-indian rights and against racism. A close reading of their website will tell the astute reader otherwise.

It is the opinion of both Public Eye and the Montana Human Rights Network (he later also a personal conversation) that wherever Indians are fighting for sovereign rights you will find CERA trying to stop them, and that this would hold especially true for a place like Middleboro where a CERA member lives nearby.

Carol Kelley has been at three or more meetings in Middleboro and we have copies of two emails from her to CasinoFacts.org president Jackie Tolosko which received a positive reception. She also wrote a letter to the editor to the Brockton Enterprise (7/21/07 but not online) urging Middleboro residents to vote against the casino and saying that the tribe only wanted their yes votes so they could use them when they went to Washington. Here's what she wrote:

 

The tribe wants only one thing it wants an agreement to be taken to Washington to claim the community of Middleboro wants an Indian casino. From that point on they will claim any opposition, however widespread and wellgrounded to be no more than anti-Indian racist and elistists. Not in my Backyard obstructionists.

The people ofthe town must realize that the tribe has no interest in making any deal to protect the town or benefit the community, only a deal to smooth their lobbying in Washington.

This is typical CERA rhetoric. They seem to believe by just saying they aren't racist makes it so. But the if you scratch the distrust and cynicism expressed in the sentences above the stench of racism rises forth. While Middleboro residents joined togther in oposition to the casino rarely if ever mention Indian sovereignty, to CERA this is a curse, below causing community serices to be cut or taxpayers to bear more costs. She neglects to mention that the town and tribe have just hammered out an unprecedented partnership that suggest just the opposite of us being used by the tribe.

 

The tribe cannot be taxed and assessed because of common law "sovereign immunity" doctrine. Unless the residents want to have a sharp cut in community services or if they want to keep the services at the same level they enjoy now, any increase in services will have to be paid for by non-Indian residents and taxpayers.

Is CERA involved with CasinoFacts beyond the two emails we know about? At this point we don't have any evidence to this effect. However, what is keeping CasinoFacts from utterly repudiating their message, and what Carol Kelley wrote in the Brockton Enterprise, and any formal or informal connection with her or them?