OK, are you revving up your motors yet?
It's only three days until the day after Thanksgiving, affectionately known as "Black Friday" by retailers, because it supposedly is the day that the volume of business pushes them into the "black" for the year.
Get started, get ready, GO!
Well, not only are retailers so suffering this year that they have had "pre-Black Friday" sales, but the day can be a deadly one, and I am not talking about to retailers' pocketbooks.
Last year, a crowd stampeded a Wal-Mart in Valley Stream, Long Island, and trampled a young man who, because of his size, was sent to the front of the store to maintain crowd control. A couple of thousand idiots pushed the doors down, it fell on him, and rather than help him up, they ran into the store, trampling him.
The holiday frenzy has continued locally even before the holiday. I am sure you heard that some teenage heart-throb was supposed to sign autographs at a store in Long Island's Roosevelt Field Mall, but another stampede erupted, he was sent away, and teenage girls and their moms would have none of that. There were several people hurt and a promoter was arrested for not "Tweeting" that the event was cancelled.
Rather than say that this is a Long Island thing, this type of "horde" shopper is a result of the constant pounding we get, from literally September on, about door-buster deals that the department stores offer customers for the holidays. These idiots (the customers) fall for all the shopping paranoia, and forget about being human in the process.
Who do you blame? Do you blame the stores for trying to get the last dollar of their customers, or do you blame the customers, who are almost hypnotized by these great deals on things they really don't need?
I think it is a mix of the two. Stores offer these deals without a hint of the security needed to corral these animalistic customers, and the customers, well, they just lose any common decency that they have when it comes to getting the "best" deal.
So when you do your holiday shopping this week, remember that you are a human being, and treat people as such. Getting the best deal isn't really that important, is it, when you look at the grand scheme of things.
I usually go before Black Friday--on the day before Thanksgiving--to do my shopping. I simply cannot deal with the rude, arrogant people that have nothing but bargains on their mind on Black Friday.
Shopping should never resemble a WWE bout. So watch yourself during this holiday season--because it is obvious that nobody else is watching out for you.
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