Like Japan, horse racing is a popular form of gambling in Australia. There are some big annual horse racing events in Australia, for example the Melbourne Cup, which I covered in a previous blog, where both men and women dress up for the races on the day, go to the racetrack or party and watch live broadcasts of the races. It’s such a big event that part of Melbourne gets a holiday. As well as horseracing, Australia also has dog racing. Being such keen sports fans, sports bet is a popular system for betting on sports like rugby, cricket, soccer, basketball, boxing and so on. Cricket is a sport about as popular as baseball in Japan, while rugby and soccer are just as popular. Of course, people enjoy the pure pleasure of watching games, but others also enjoy betting on which team wins. Australia is actually a casino kingdom and has casinos in major cities including Canberra, Sydney, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth, and Cairns. Pubs and surf clubs in urban areas have slot machines called "pokies" as well as screens broadcasting horse and dog races live. Gambling has permeated everyday life that far in Australia. In fact, there are also companies that offer other kinds of amusing bets that make me think “Really? You can bet on that?” Apart from betting on sports, a number of Australia's largest bookmakers, including Sportsbet at the top of the list, offer betting on things like who will win reality TV shows. In Australia, there are shows that air seasonally, for example, The Bachelor Australia (apparently a Japanese version was aired in Japan), a show where a single man (bachelor) selects the woman he wants as his partner from among 30 beautiful single women, with a few women being dropped every week on the show until the final episode when two are selected, he professes his love to one of the women, and the winner is decided. You bet on who will win the show. Women that the male reacts to well, women with a high probability of becoming the so-called winner, have low odds, while women who viewers feel by watching the show don’t seem to attract the interest of the male have higher odds. The Australian Survivor is another popular show on a deserted island where a few dozen male and female participants are divided into two teams and through games and races under harsh mental and physical conditions with limited food, the losing group loses one of its members every week. The last one to survive the game (the Survivor) wins the prize money. In The Block, couples, pairs of siblings, and so on renovate run-down buildings into stylish homes and the team who sells at the highest price wins the prize money. Betting is on who will win. Looking at things from this angle, I realized there are relatively few dramas and singing shows in Australia but many game shows with winners and losers. In addition to TV shows, you can also bet on which show, which actor, and which actress will win the Primetime Emmy Award, which awards the most popular TV shows, dramas, actors, and actresses. And surprisingly, you can also bet on national elections in Australia, the UK, and the US, so it seems like they’re saying, “Go and bet on anything where there’s a winner and loser.” In an environment like this where people are surrounded by gambling, gambling addiction is also a problem in Australia, so there are addiction helplines, ads about the dangers of gambling addiction posted in pubs and other places, and bookmakers are tightening the personal screening procedure for becoming a member who can participate in betting. Everything in moderation is best, right?


Sportsbet website. This page shows the names and odds of the women participating in The Bachelor Australia.