Friday morning, a man was trampled to death trying to open a Wal*Mart in New York. The death was shocking enough, but what one employee told news reporters nearly made me cry for the state of our society. “When they were saying they had to leave, that an employee got killed, people were yelling ‘I’ve been on line since yesterday morning,’ ” she said. “They kept shopping. It’s not right. They’re savages.”
Yes you read right....A man died...they kept shopping.
At a Wal*Mart in Columbus, OH a woman jumped on a man's back and began beating on him screaming "That's MY TV!!!" when she noticed a TV she had was in his shopping basket.
At a Wal-Mart in Niles, Ill., a mother fought back tears when she discovered someone had taken her shopping cart filled with toys.
United Food and Commercial Workers Union leader Bruce Both has come out and said that the trampling death in New York was preventable. Police said that the store may not have had enough security.
Wal*Mart as usual, defended theirselves by stating that the store had hired temporary help and security guards to accomidate the increased crowd.
The question I have, is why weren't they guarding the front door when the store was opening?
I've always been a vocal critic of Wal*Mart, because I don't believe their business practices honor the principals of a free market. They force their laborers in China to pay for housing, so they pretty much force housing on them. They undercut American manufacturing jobs by opening plants wherever you can find cheap sub-American labor practices.
They fight unionization tooth and nail, and urge their employees to take government aid. They offer low quality goods at a price that eliminates the spirit of competition. The reason they have low prices is the tax subsidies they receive and their labor practices.
However, in a time in this country where more people vote for American Idol than vote for their government officials, is it a wonder that "Black Friday" has become a mindless mass of human rage?
I wonder how much Credit Card debt was created on "Black Friday"
"Black Friday" is known as the day when retail stores intend to "Go into the black" and report growth in profits for the year.
I would argue that it's not a retail holiday, but a bankers' holiday. To think that we're smack in the middle of a Recession, with a great depression staring us down, and people are still getting violent over cheap foreign toys and electronics. Those banks that issue those monthly Visa and Mastercard statements must be smiling.
When will we learn that our consumer society is tearing us apart. After reading about the trample death, I thought to myself, "How many opportunities were there for ONE PERSON of the mass to realize that there is a human there and push everyone out of the way and help the guy up before he was dead?"
If you were up at 4 AM on friday burning a half a tank of gas to sandwich through the traffic jams and stand shoulder to shoulder through lines to put foreign goods on plastic money, I pray for you today.
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1 comment:
I was going to post about that bullshit, too. You pretty much covered it, though. There were a few employees who tried to help the guy who was trampled and they nearly met the same fate as him.
At the big chain stores where I am, I heard stories of people waiting in the stores with their hands hovering over shit waiting for the sale to begin, and peole stealing from eachothers carts, and even snatching toys out of childrens hands when their parents weren't looking. It is a sickness.
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