He's probably right. There is a story Warren Buffet tells, where he says if you were at sea and got shipwrecked, and fifty of you made it to land, a fertile island where you could grow rice, and you were put in charge, what would you do? Would you get your smartest 5 guys of the 50 and tell them to start trading rice futures and creating derivatives? And probably give them a better way of life and higher social status for it, too? No, you'd get them growing rice like everybody else...
That said though, in a capitalistic developed society like ours there is obviously a demand for them, or they wouldn't exist. I don't think they are really just 'gambling' in the way the article seems to paint them, there will be managers above the traders and people keeping checks on them.