The name "Black Friday" was first appended to the day after Thanksgiving in 1966 in Philadelphia, where citizens complained of the increased vehicle and pedestrian traffic as shoppers went forth to shop on the day after Thanksgiving.
Yesterday, 10,000 people were at Macy's in New York, at midnight, waiting for the doors to open. Reports like these are typical:
"I thought I was going to get run over," Lindsay O'Rourke said after shopping at a Target store in Tulsa, Okla.
"It was insane," (said Michelle Mandel at Victoria's Secret in Davenport, IA). "I had people climbing my merchandise and throwing product through the store. It was crazy."
You wonder who estimates these things, but whoever it is says that about 152 million people went shopping yesterday. That's half the country. By any definition, that is what is called "mass consumerism."
Obviously, there is no connection between celebration of Christmas, the incarnation of Christ, and the mass purchase of cheap products that few people actually want.
It is a tremendous witness to the power of consumerism and capitalism, however, that people will mindlessly and willingly enter into a bizarro-world of crowds and carnival barkers simply because advertising has convinced them that there is a "bargain" they must have.
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