Query about mucking cards

Please help me to end this debate my friends and I have with one particular player...

...on the showdown, does the winner have the right to see the hands of those who call him/her down? One of my friends thinks it's okay to muck his hands even if he has called down a raiser or even bet himself. Is this right? As I understand it, you muck your hand by folding.

as ahh see it..if someone calls you ...you have to show your cards..if he has lost he can muck his cards without showing em to you....i have this argument at live games all the time..just take the chips and laugh out loud while baiting about himself and his ugly wife/boyfriend/girlfriend....it works for me

The winner of the hand has the right to request to see the cards of any player who went to showdown with him.

Note that this rule is intended as a collusion preventer, and requesting to see a hand just for the sake of seeing it is considered poor etiquette.

Dorkus is right but at our home games the looser at the end either shows or doesn't. It would be nice to know what his hands were but it is no big deal. Makes it all the more interesting. I saw Phil Helmuth get upset because someone asked to see his cards at the end of the hand. He was just being a brat again but it was funny to see.

My view is this. If they called you down and wants to see your hand, you HAVE to show it. Usually what I do is I throw away my hand when my opponent shows me his higher hand. If my opponent tells me he/she wants to see my hand, I show him/her. If he/she doesn't ask, I don't show. They paid to see it, they have the right to see it if they want to.

hey (im newbie in here btw)

just a thought on a very similar subject.... when playing online, i think its a great shame you cant 'SHOW' your cards when youve pushed someone out.....

i realise that this is a very very rare occasion that you want to show your cards(showing your opponents your play)..... but if you think of this scenario(spellcheck?)

Your in a SNG or MTT, your're normally tight /aggr, but you hit 2 or 3 monster pocket cards in the first few hands, and play in an aggressive way, but you clearly get outflopped,.... other players then catch on and think that your a 'poor' player.. and you find it very hard to hold any respect in any of your raising....(and get several calls to your every raise..)

any thoughts?

(personally i like to see poor pocket hands early on, so i can watch other peoples play, for this reason)

I dont think this is correct. The winner only has the right to see other hands if he called the last bet made in the hand. If the winner bets, and someone else calls him, that other person is free to muck his hand. You only HAVE to show if you were called, according to official poker rules. You can ask anytime you want, but they dont always have to show even if you win the hand.

Right... I get it now... so if he bets and I call he has to show his cards? But if I bet and he calls then he doesn't?

Just because a player calls a bet doesn't mean anyone automatically gets to see anyone's cards.
In live play, learn to flick your cards indistinguishably into the muck assuming the other player tables a better hand than yours out of turn.
Once, they are mucked, no dealer can rightfully search through the muck to pull out your cards.