Why Are Children Easily Trapped in Online Gambling?

The statement from the Minister of Communication and Digital, as quoted from KOMPAS.com, that “200,000 Indonesian children are exposed to online gambling” and that this situation constitutes “the destruction of children’s future” illustrates the urgency of the problem facing today’s digital society. However, there is a more fundamental question: how is it possible that digital spaces can so easily shape children’s behaviour, while educational institutions, family, and social environment appear to have lost their influence? This phenomenon is not merely a matter of weak supervision or individual morality, but rather a sign of a major change in the cultural landscape in which children grow and learn. Today, children are not only educated by school and family, but also by algorithms, media culture, and the relentless logic of digital economics that shape their desires, attention, and imagination about life. From the perspective of anthropology of education, school is not merely a place for transferring knowledge. School is a space for forming meaning, values, habits, and ways humans understand the world. Education is therefore related to culture, because through education a society passes on its way of life to the next generation. Therefore, the issue of online gambling among children actually opens up deeper questions: what kind of values is society passing on through schools today? In other words, education takes place throughout the cultural space. School is no longer the sole centre for forming children’s awareness. Educational authority has been fragmented. If in the past teachers and family were the main sources of social values, today those positions compete with digital algorithms, influencers, entertainment platforms, and the global media industry. Children live in a digital world that continuously produces instant desires. A world that offers quick sensations, quick wins, quick entertainment, and quick money. Online gambling thrives in such a culture because it does not appear as a seemingly criminal activity, but rather as part of everyday entertainment culture. In many modern societies, success is increasingly measured through consumption and economic achievement. Children from an early age witness that social recognition often comes from owning goods, digital popularity, and the ability to make money. Such a culture creates a social imagination that luck and wealth can be obtained without a long process.