When I see people making money on Iran attacks, and murder of heads of state - it shows clearly something is deeply wrong with Polymarket. Its a level worse than Vegas or Indian casinos. A literal ticket to hell. I'm all for banning these evil sites.
I don’t think they allow bets regarding if someone is going to die or not?
All of these "politican out" markets will resolve to true if the politician dies: https://polymarket.com/predictions/out.
The language is usually "This market will resolve to “Yes” if <politician> ceases to be <Prime Minister/President/whatever>".
Or for another example: https://polymarket.com/event/will-neymar-play-in-the-2026-fi.... Will Neymar play in the world cup? Not if he's dead. Any kind of "will celebrity appear in X in the future" can be reduced to an assassination market.
Sounds like this could easily be worked around by placing a bet on something that will definitely happen as a result of a death, i.e. "bet $X on whether Iran will close the strait".
How is it evil? CNN makes money on Iran attack and murders, are they evil too?
Which is more likely: CNN commits murder to increase viewership; or any one of billions of people commits murder to win a bet?
well I see more problematic the people actually doing the Iran attacks and murder of heads of state. Betting on those is distasteful, but doing those things is where the damage lies.
It's not because specifically with these markets there is an amplification effect where the one doing the bet creates incentives for what it's betting in favor or against to materialize in the world.
In other words the money spent on bets that involve killing directly foments more killing.
Military insiders can also buy oil futures...
the entire point of the argument is that they're the same people. Military bets appear to have significantly higher rates of insider trading than baseline[1], which implies two things, both catastrophic. One is that the markets leak classified information (which is the entire point of the market and it should be a national security no brainer to close it for that reason alone) but the even worse scenario is causality in the other direction, that a bet leads someone to take a military decision.
[1]https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2026/04/30/polymarket-s-mil...
something is deeply wrong with some humans
Its just a dark mirror episode. I can't imagine waking up and thinking "boy I'll really make some money if we kill Ayatollah Khomeini today"
The other side of that argument could be something like: "Dude, Khomeini better not be killed, it'd suck for me, an average iranian dude. I'd probably bet he dies so I can hedge my personal financial wellbeing for that case"
> so I can hedge
There are several things about the "these are good because people can hedge" argument which bother me and I struggle to disentangle them, but one facet is this: These betting-markets may be an inferior form of hedging, especially for non-trivial scenarios that are intended to evoke sympathy. (Civilizations have a lot of prior art in risk-management.)
For example, our statistical Iranian Dude may be much better-off using their bet-money for targeted purposes, like stocking up on useful imported durable goods that may become unavailable, ideally ones that would have resale value even if nothing bad happens.
The convenient online casino doesn't require any more than a vague sense of anxiety to bet, but that generality also limits how well you can use the money to protect yourself. If you're specifically worried about famine, better to arrange a future result of food, versus a payout of cash when nobody is selling food. If you're a factory that uses X as a manufacturing input and worried about a geopolitical blockade, you may be better off investing in alternate supplies or futures contracts for X.
The average iranian dude is not going to send money to a company that has donald trump junior on its board of directors to 'hedge their bets' around the Iran war situation.
Which is also hardly imaginable.
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It’s icky to see someone make a moral argument to have something banned, and even worse if they want the government to be the arbiter of morality.
Did we really kill God to have some bloodsuckers in suits tell us what’s right and what’s wrong?
So I take it you have a problem with laws against murder, fraud, theft, etc.
Aside from the government, who is it that you prefer to do judgment and enforcement?
I’m not saying immoral things can’t be banned. I’m saying that to ban something we must be able to construct an argument that does not hinge on morality. For example, theft is bad because it deprives you of your possessions. No need to invoke morality.
And yes, you can construct an argument to ban polymarket that does not rely on morality too. But don’t try to sell it to me with a “we will ban it because it’s eeeeevil”.
> For example, theft is bad because it deprives you of your possessions. No need to invoke morality.
This assertion also hinges on morality. Why is being deprived of your possessions bad. You ultimately have to reach for an ethical framework to justify it.
> to ban something we must be able to construct an argument that does not hinge on morality. For example, theft is bad because it deprives you of your possessions. No need to invoke morality.
Ok, I'll bite. Why is it bad to deprive you of your possessions?
And given that the house always wins, is it not depriving the gamblers of their possessions?
Gambling creates addicts, and addicts are more likely to act in desperation. They might steal, default on debt, or kill themselves and are less productive members of society. I bet societies with lots of addicts are much less likely to thrive because they carry a ton of dead weight. Thus we should ban or at least curb gambling because it hurts us all in general.
To deeply simplify - why do we ban things?
I'd say, because we as a group decide they are "bad".
Not sure how you can remove moral judgments from any discussion of banning
Which human law does not ultimately hinge on morality?
That literally is a type of morality, utilitarianism. Kantian deontology is not the only form of morality structure there is.
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If your argument supports "murder for hire should be legal," then the problem is your argument.
>It’s icky to see someone make a moral argument to have something banned
Which are valid arguments in your opinion?