Here’s another reason I’m glad I didn’t keep that job at Walmart: an employee was killed when a bargain-crazed mob rushed the doors of a Walmart in Long Island when they opened for today’s “special” sales. Today, as we all know, is “Black Friday” — which has become the day I stay home. Not that I have any money to spend, but even if I did, the insanity that this “tradition” has devolved into makes the few dollars I might save, assuming I would be able to get my hands on any of the “while supplies last” goodies, aren’t worth it.
If we were still a civilized nation and not on the brink of Third World-dom, we’d abolish “Black Friday” and just have a normal shopping day. Or the stores would stay closed on the Friday following Thanksgiving so people could spend more time with their families like they always say they want to. But God forbid someone not make a few extra pennies; never mind that encouraging events like this are actually going to bring the economy to its knees (perhaps when people decide to stay away in droves from stores because, well, they don’t want to be trampled to death by a horde of bloated chavs* looking to save 20% on their fifth wide-screen plasma tv) that much sooner.
*We really do need a special word for the sort of lower-class, often-welfare-supported, yet overfed, over-supplied with unnecessary material goods like brand-name shoes and clothes and electronic equipment, under-educated and ill-mannered ranks like the British do with “chav,” which I believe is even racially inclusive, whereas the term “yob” more specifically referred to a white, lower-class, uneducated thug. I think in Long Island and New Jersey they use the word “guido” but that just refers to people of Italian descent. Well for now I am appropriating “chav.”
Update: more on Protein Wisdom.
4 Responses to “Shopper’s Paradise”
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November 29th, 2008 at 4:40 am
I’ve noticed this year a new trend where some stores were open Thanksgiving day! Gander Mountain was open from 3pm to 9pm, just in case there were hordes of outdoorsmen who needed to buy a tent after devouring their body weight in turkey and pie. Pretty soon all the stores will be open and it’ll be just another day.
And I second your nomination of chav as a term of derision and will begin using it immediately:
I saw a clan of chavs at the grocery store tonight using food stamps to buy a cartload of junk, thought of you and your ramen noodles, and wanted to bash their skulls in and mail you their EBT card.
November 29th, 2008 at 11:47 am
AH, once again you said what I felt, only you said it in an interesting way (am I sucking up too much?).
I’m no anti-capitalist, anti-corporate, knee-jerk sort – I hope I’m not! – but there are times when it seems we’re “supposed to” jump through hoops spending money on cue and salivating at the appropriate bell.
It’s insanity to think that we can continue growing and spending endlessly. We’re encouraged to go into debt to buy stuff to make our lives meaningul but when will it be enough? ’cause stuff gets broken and lost and stolen and then what? More stuff?
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:13 am
Yeah, we need a ‘Murrican equivalent for “chav.” None of the existing derogations seem to work quite right. What we need is something that includes all the things Andrea listed, plus an overblown sense of entitlement, that sort of “bubble mentality” (“It doesn’t matter that I’m screaming obscenities into my cell phone late at night on the train!”), and that sort of generalized incivility to other human beings.
I don’t know. I find that going into any store (short of a small craft-supply store or an uncrowded antique shop) this time of year tries my usually-tenuous tolerance of humanity. (On the up side? If I ever find myself becoming too merry, I can just haul off to the local wal-mart and spend about 10 minutes there, and it will calm me right down.)
December 3rd, 2008 at 1:55 pm
Every time I go into a store a crack team of Screaming Baby Installers descends upon the establishment. If I have a throbbing headache they include a bonus Tantrummy Toddler.