Happy Belated Thanksgiving to all my American readers! I hope that you all had a wonderful day celebrating with family and friends! Although Canada tends to be America 2.0 in many respects, we have our own Thanksgiving Day in October, so Thursday was just a boring old work day for all of us up here (although many of us definitely snuck in some football action).
While our day didn’t involve fancy things like turkey, stuffing and pumpkin pie, today is a different story. Up until a few years ago, Black Friday did not exist in Canada. I remember taking a break from studying and paper writing to go to the mall and try to find some deals on “Black Friday” in 2011. The only problem was that there were no deals. There were no promotions. There were no doorcrashers. Black Friday did not yet exist in Canada. My past shopaholic self was certainly disappointed and I remember resenting the fact that I had not planned a trip down to the States for a Black Friday shopping spree. My more minimalist present self now resents the fact that I ever thought driving 5 hours to go to a mall on the busiest day of the year was a good idea.
Corporations have assimilated and we now “celebrate” Black Friday here in Canada. Americans, you’re probably thinking how strange it is that we don’t celebrate Thanksgiving, yet we partake in Black Friday. Well, us Canadians find it odd that you fight over TVs mere hours after you’ve expressed thankfulness for what you already have. Who are we to judge though? On December 26, the day after Christmas, we have HUGE Boxing Day sales; after spending ridiculous amounts of money on Christmas gifts and receiving innumerable gifts ourselves, we head back to the stores the following day to spend even more money. Sound stupid? That’s because it is. Yet millions of us still partake in this “holiday” that corporations have invented to keep us spending our hard-earned money on the various plastic, metal and fabric objects that they sell.
So without further ado, I give you three reasons why I will be avoiding Black Friday (and Boxing Day too) like the Black Death this year.
It perpetuates our consumeristic culture
What comes to mind when you think of Black Friday? Most people think of a day with sales as far as the eye can see, where crowds trample (and sometimes even kill) one another to get the best deal on any and all consumer products that will be out of style and/or obsolete in just a few months’ time. It’s a stampede of blind consumerism, and is the epitome of a capitalist orgy. While the stores may encourage us to participate in Black Friday with their various sales, they’re not putting a gun to our heads and forcing us to go shopping. Consumers are willingly making the choice to spend their money on objects that are futile and produced for much less than they are on sale for. We are the ones who keep this negative aspect of our culture alive by being willing slaves to commercialism.
Black Friday for stores, but a Red Friday for consumers
In case you didn’t know, Black Friday was a “positive” name coined by retailers in the 1980s because it’s a day when they are successful and make an insane profit. Accountants use black to signify profit, while red is used to indicate loss. Corporations are always profitable and “in the black” on the day after Thanksgiving. Consumers though? Not so much. On Black Friday in 2015, Americans spent 67.6 BILLION dollars. In one day. That is INSANE.
Want to know the best way to save money on Black Friday? Not spending any to begin with. Because if you’re “saving” money while spending it, then you’re not really saving it at all, are you? Half of all Canadians and Americans are living paycheck to paycheck (48% and 49%, respectively). We can’t afford to pay for our rent, gas or groceries, yet somehow we can still get the newest Apple product or 4K TV. We don’t live within our means to begin with, and the existence of Black Friday certainly doesn’t help when it pressures us to buy even more things that we can’t afford in order to impress people we don’t like.
When you truly think about it, it’s just sad
The best things in life aren’t objects. Objects are just a distraction to make us forget the real meaning of life that exists in the simple things. If you want to know what the real meaning of life is, ask someone who only has a short time left on this earth. I’ve never heard of anyone on their deathbed saying things like, “I wish I’d bought those Armani shoes” or “I should have gotten the iPhone 5 on the day that it was released in 2012.” The real meaning of life is found in people, experiences, and adventures. That’s why the most common end-of-life regrets include working too much, investing too little time in relationships, and living a life dictated by societal expectations. We feel inadequate, so we buy things we don’t need, fall into debt, and then must work more to pay for all the objects we’ve bought but can’t actually afford. In the midst of all this chaos, we miss out on the things that really matter: experiencing amazing new things and making memories with the people around us.
This Black Friday, don’t feel like you are a slave to consumerism. Black Friday is the last thing we need in our society of excessive consumption. You don’t have to partake in a day where people trample one another in order to prepare themselves for Christmas, a day where objects take the place of human feelings.
I’m not saying that you can’t participate in Black Friday. If you need something and you’ve saved for it, then go right ahead and buy it. Just please say no to consumption for consumption’s sake. Instead, say yes to thankfulness and gratitude for the things that you already own, and the people that surround you each and every day.
Until my next rambling essay,
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