Met a few power tripping, bullying assholes in my 20 years in casinos. Mostly the dealers are alright, the waitresses are nice enough but seem to host their own private dramas in the kitchen, cashiers and receptionists are fine. Even the customers are decent enough people 99% of the time. Management though. I feel like spitting when I think of some of the things I have witnessed.

First and foremost, most of them need a massive amount of cognitive dissonance to function, gas lighting is a close second trait. It’s fair to say that there are a few that are ok but they are quite rare. Whereas 99% of customers are nice people, it seems to be 1% of managers are decent people in my experience. They get into a comfortable position and look down at others from their high horse, usually because it’s what happened to them in the past so now it’s “their turn”.

There are two main bullies in my current workplace. One gets angry every time a dealer pays out an amount over £500, he will kick chipping machines, break pens and walk off to smoke a cigarette outside, he will remove dealers from tables if they are paying out too often, he stares at games angrily when someone is winning as well, he trash talks staff when they aren’t around and is just generally unpleasant to work with. The other one acts like he’s the saviour of the whole casino, he makes out like he does everything selflessly, he will go and take over from inspecting tables with a cup of tea in his hand, acting casual like it’s no big deal whatever is happening. At the same time he practically does nothing but drink tea and brag about all the things he does. During my shift I sometimes check the cctv for fun to see what exactly they did and it’s usually not a lot but then when you ask them about it, “Oh god I didn’t stop but you know we can handle things like that”. He’s a one upper as well, if you did something, he’s done it but always way more. Dealt a busy game? ”nah, you don’t know what busy is, when I dealt, the table looked like New York City with all the chips piled so high”. He’s another short angry man though.

Then you get the wannabe managers, some that already read the mantra “fake it til you make it” and do just that. Either through nepotism or favouritism they get what they desire most in the workplace and make other people’s lives hell. One in particular is another short angry man, he treats people like shit and likes to act like he’s the owner. Each time he would try to focus on me I would just look over his head and say “I can’t see who’s talking” he would turn bright red, just like his tie and walk off. He stands watching dealers with his arms crossed and nodding like he’s some kind of Caesar acknowledging your right to breathe.

I’m at the position in my career where I have no desire to progress further in terms of promotions, because fuck it, it’s just a job, but I’m knowledgable enough to know more than most of the management and the wannabes there, so I have some leeway with what I can get away with. I fix a lot of things and am generally well liked by the actual owner. This often leads to situations like the above where someone will be feeling bad about themselves and try to take it out on me but I can be quite harsh with my responses when provoked. I’m not really afraid to point out the truth in those kind of situations.

So yes, I had a bit of a rant but those are the kinds of people you can expect to work with in casinos. Go and travel the world to work in another one and it’s still the same.