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It's "Black Friday" and Holiday Shopping Begins!
California Poppy
Here in the US, today is what is traditionally known as "Black Friday" which is considered by many as the kick-off of the holiday shopping season.
Many "Big Box" and chain retail stores go to great lengths to try to lure people in with amazing offers and various gimmicks. Is it really holiday joy, or consumerism gone mad?
As stores offer increasingly intriguing deals to attract shoppers, each year there are injuries as people stampede to try to snap up deals... often at 6:00am in the morning, when the stores first open.
Meanwhile, some online retailers have such heavy site traffic that shoppers are finding it difficult to check out and completely their web purchases.
Of course, I realize that many may live in places that don't have the equivalent of a Day-after-Thanksgiving Black Friday, so let's widen the topic.
Is this the "Spirit" of the Season?
I'm 57 years old, and when I was little the holidays we're mostly about FOOD and PEOPLE. Sure, "getting gifts" was a nice thing, but it wasn't the driving force of the holidays... even when I was a little kid.
Have we lost our sense of direction?
Today, it often seems like the entire emphasis of the Holiday Season is on "consuming;" everything is "buy, buy, buy!" And sometimes it feels like the whole occasion has been reduced to a slightly surreal contest of "who WON at Christmas," like it's all a contest of giving and/or getting the biggest pile of stuff.
So, for today's discussion I pose this question-- has society; our world in general, just gone overboard on exploiting the holiday season as a commercial opportunity? Has the original "reason for the season" been lost? Has "consuming" replaced "connecting?" Or do you think things as much as they have always been? Or, alternately, do you see the consumption as a good thing; a sign that people are better off?
Share your thoughts and experiences below!
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Created at 171124 16:30 PDT