You guys ready for Black Friday?

[kvnchrist]

Who here is tired of listening The Reason for the Season from one side of peoples mouths and promotion of a gift buying free-for-all out of the other?

The idea that there are adults out there that will go through serious anxiety attacks because they can't afford a Tickle-me Elmo doll. When did a frenzy of purchasing toys and games ever become the replacement for love in the family?

When did love ever depend on what you could put in a child's hand and not what you put in their hearts.?

I grew up as a Jehovah's Witness child, I never had a Christmas and always, for years had to go back to school after the Xmas vacation to set and listen to all these rich kids talk about how many presents they'd gotten and how much they hated most of them. I know how it feels to search through the Sears wish book hour by hour and see commercial after commercial about some great and wonderful toy, you couldn't live without.

Those days are long gone and Xmas isn't any more of a holiday to me than my birthday, which wasn't celebrated either. This is no problem to me, but it is to those kids out there whose families are poor and underprivileged. I know how they feel. I know how it is not to get these shiny bobbles that so many who do get them don't appreciate them and to turn insult into injury, parade the fact that they have what you will never get.

I am not against buying in moderation, but not as a duty to perform as if it were a parents duty to a child to get the best, the brightest and most shiny new got to have device on the market. These parents also become victims of this buy craze as they feel guilty somehow, if they can't get their children, what they call a decent Xmas. It's if nothing they had done for them all year long is completely without merit, unless the kid gets his Elmo doll.

Xmas, above all the other days of the year is when society reaches out to the poor children of this and every other country who is drowning in wealth and slaps their children across the face with the full revelation that they come from a poor family.

Is this the barrier we wish to set up to distinguish whose family is the better family. Are the rich, somehow a better family, because they can afford these bobbles and poor families can't? Is there, automatically more love in a families house that has an Elmo doll in it, than one who doesn't?

The axiety that people feel is the most horrible felling alive. It cuts right to the bone for those who love their family just as much at Xmas time as they do 6 months later. It's like they are pressured to over-perform on one day a year, to be a good parent and then play catchup with their finances to get out of the red, they placed themselves, just because of an idea that was never part of the original idea behind Xmas, in the first place.

[Oubliette]

Meh. As a formerly poor child and now a poor adult, I'd say the slap in the face of the haves to the have-nots is pretty much a year round annoyance. At least during the holiday season my family eats a lot better (in quantity at least if not quality; soul food, gotta love it, but it's mostly cheap, fatty, salty and full of sugar) and make an effort to let everyone know they're loved.

Edited November 28, 2013 by Oubliette

[bben46]

I refuse to do any shopping on Thanksgiving day or Black Friday - I will be out and around visiting relatives and overeating.

[Lisnpuppy]

I actually went out today but not for black friday. My daughter is on vacation with her Father and we are having actual dinner tomorrow. I am making some presents this year and need some craft items so I could work over the weekend. Michaels was open so it was a convenience stop. No one really was there.

 

Other than that all my shopping is done or in progress of being made.

 

I love Christmas (or Mithris Day as I sometimes call it) as this time of year has been celebrated by all cultures for thousands of years. I love the lights and the snow (when we get it) and the excitement. I love the music and the sense of hope I get like no other time of the year. We do presents and all but also do other more important family things.

 

My daughter always makes presents for family and her girlfriends (with me.) It has become a tradition with us that I enjoy very much. My daughter, who turns 16 in January...surprised me with wanting to continue another silly tradition I started when she was little. I would get us like or similar PJs to wear on Christmas Eve/morning. I figured she would be over that being a teenager at almost 16. She asked the other day if we were going to get matching PJs. I admit I teared up a little.

 

So when she gets back from vacation...I have a surprise for her. Matching purple jammies with little lambs on them (she loves lammies!!) I should note she is taller than I am now..by at least 3 inches. But it makes me very happy that she still isn't too big-at least for one night- to be my little girl.

 

And that my friends, it what it is all about.

[Tidus44]

I will admit some level of confusion regarding Thanksgiving Day as it isn't exactly a holiday I have a great deal of familiarity with. However, my thought is that the "Reason for the Season" (as it were) was to give thanks for what one has.

To clarify, the day is not about "I feel bad (or guilty) about what others have (or don't have)" day or "I'm jealous of what others have" day or even "I feel thankful it's a great day for shopping" day.

 

There are 7 billion people on the planet and if someone is buying an Elmo doll to gain the love of their child, then I suppose I'm thankful that isn't my life. If there is someone out there who can't buy an Elmo doll to gain the love of their child, then I guess I'm thankful that isn't my life either. But, in all honesty, I don't feel all that responsible for whatever it is others have or do or don't do or don't have or how they gain the love of their child or even if they want to go shopping for some bargain.

 

As I said earlier, I'm not exactly all that familiar with what Thanksgiving Day is about, but I don't think I'll make it a day to be guilty or lament or be jealous or be critical of someone else. I think I'll just enjoy the company of some friends and be thankful for what I have.

[HeyYou]

I will admit some level of confusion regarding Thanksgiving Day as it isn't exactly a holiday I have a great deal of familiarity with. However, my thought is that the "Reason for the Season" (as it were) was to give thanks for what one has.

To clarify, the day is not about "I feel bad (or guilty) about what others have (or don't have)" day or "I'm jealous of what others have" day or even "I feel thankful it's a great day for shopping" day.

 

There are 7 billion people on the planet and if someone is buying an Elmo doll to gain the love of their child, then I suppose I'm thankful that isn't my life. If there is someone out there who can't buy an Elmo doll to gain the love of their child, then I guess I'm thankful that isn't my life either. But, in all honesty, I don't feel all that responsible for whatever it is others have or do or don't do or don't have or how they gain the love of their child or even if they want to go shopping for some bargain.

 

As I said earlier, I'm not exactly all that familiar with what Thanksgiving Day is about, but I don't think I'll make it a day to be guilty or lament or be jealous or be critical of someone else. I think I'll just enjoy the company of some friends and be thankful for what I have.

I think he is more referring to kicking off the "christmas" season.

 

Here in the states, it seems that everything is about being a good little consumer. One of the reasons I gave up on broadcast television. it isn't just a seasonal thing, it's all year round. The volume simply ramps up this time of year.

[Vagrant0]

As someone who has worked in retail the last few years, on Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Christmas Eve, Christmas, and New Years Eve (in addition to most holidays), I have a few mixed feelings on the subject, but let me provide a different perspective.

 

First, not everyone has family and friends with which to spend the holiday with. Those that do, who work in retail, usually understand that having to work on these holidays goes with the name of the job, just as how it goes with the name of the job when you're a pilot, doctor, bus driver, police officer, or any number of other service personnel who also typically get staffed during the holidays. It may not be to the same degree necessity, but follows a similar level of personal acceptance of just what goes with the job. And likewise, those people with family tend to plan other points in time when they can spend time together to maintain the spirit of the holidays. For those people that work in retail, holidays become a period of time where they tend to earn more per hour than any other day, giving them the money to spend on others, or taking care of those yearly costs... Like taxes.

 

Second, most of the rush shopping that tends to happen on these days is among those people who work very hard for what little money they have, who have very few days off between their 2-3 jobs. Black Friday started as a kickoff to the holiday shopping season simply because most places in the US gave everyone the day off, so they actually had the time to get their Christmas shopping taken care of. This trend occurred somewhere around the 1970's when the economic norm moved away from hand crafted gifts to ones bought in a store. Realizing that people were picking this day as a day to shop, retailers began offering reduced prices in order to entice customers to their stores instead of competitors in hopes that the experience would be pleasant enough for the customer to shop there again later. As competition between stores ramped up, the opening time for the event started moving back further and further so that people would shop at one location instead of another. As this was going on, those people who were involved in marketing also took notice of what was being seen both among chain stores as well as privately owned retailers. Realizing that they could develop more and more hype for their products by limiting quantities, packaging items together, offering bulk discounts, or timing their advertisements around this time, they began doing so... Again so that people would choose to buy their items instead of competitors.

 

Third, realizing that prices for the normal things that people depend on also saw a price drop with these sales, they began to become periods of time when those people who don't have very much money can go and get those things they might need for lower price... Things like stoves, ovens, water heaters, televisions, refrigerators, cars, computers, and more recently phones. As these people are also that group who have few days off work, it became natural to try and plan on making any major purchases around this time just so that they could save as much as they could.

 

Instead of focusing on the negatives of all this, and being one of those grumpy people that only ends up passing their grumpiness along to others, you should look to the positives and take it all in stride. It isn't about haves and have-nots, it is about having a chance to get a leg up to improve your own situation without as high of cost; to get those things others need, or let them know how appreciated they are without it being about how much you spent on them. It's about recognizing that like yourself, everyone else is part of a similar culture, and with any larger organization forming, there will be a counter-organization which forms to cater to that first through goods and services. Instead of standing there complaining about how "wrong it is" just because it doesn't agree with your current frame of life in having a steady job, career, family, and looking down on others... Get over yourself. For those of a different lifestyle, who would otherwise be wasting the day, it becomes a day of higher productivity, where they can improve their situation, and form bonds with those that have a similar lifestyle in being able to do it all and hopefully be better from the experience.

 

 

From the standpoint of "but people die"... Really, it isn't that common that people are killed or even injured on Black Friday any more. Companies running sales have learned from their experiences and tried to do everything they can to prevent injury (and yes, for the record, I have worked Walmart's Black Friday). People die to drunk drivers, malice, carelessness, or accident every day. For most people, they are in more personal danger just by the nature of their job or their commute to and from their job than they are from shopping. It's just that these sorts of deaths are more mundane, so nobody particularly cares.

[Beriallord]

Last time I went to a Black Friday, I almost got in a fist fight with someone who thought they could cut in line in front of me. Its just too much drama that I don't want to deal with. And you can still get some deals online.

Edited December 1, 2013 by Beriallord

[Vagrant0]

Last time I went to a Black Friday, I almost got in a fist fight with someone who thought they could cut in line in front of me. Its just too much drama that I don't want to deal with. And you can still get some deals online.

That's really more evidence of the larger issue here...

 

The only thing that makes holiday shopping the hell that it is (other than paying for it), are the customers who seemingly go out of their way to antagonize others, complain that they have to wait a few extra minutes in line, or who just maintain a rude/grumpy demeanor the whole time.

[JimboUK]

It's not my idea of fun but each to thier own, people should do what they're happiest doing, there shouldn't be pressure to join the horde at the store or spend time with family.

 

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