Staff Writer
Thanksgiving
is the holiday for all of us to come together. It’s the day where schools and
work will give time off so we can gather and be thankful. Many people will get
to enjoy the entire four day weekend, but not everyone. The Friday after Thanksgiving
is the biggest retail storm of the year and those who work in retail know it’s
an important financial day, but now it looks like those same retail workers
will not be able to enjoy the holiday, itself. Although, you can’t deny that
certain retail workers are getting paid time and a half and should be happy to
get the hours, but does the corporate farm need to ruin Thanksgiving?
Many
of the stores, though, have attempted to sooth the public by claiming, “Holiday
shifts are filled with volunteers,” but the cold truth is that the majority of
Kmart workers were denied time off on the holidays when they asked for it.
Kmart, a veteran of Thanksgiving shopping, has been opening on Thanksgiving for
the past 20 years and will give a fantastic reference point for how other
corporations will handle the new “Black Thursday.” This year they are in it for
the long haul, Kmart is opening at 11 a.m. on Thursday and are staying open for
the next 42 hours (You might wanna send them a giant box of Gold Bond Pain
Relieving Foot Cream for the holidays this year).
Not
to say that there aren’t corporations that actually care about their employees.
There are approximately two dozen retailers that refuse to open on Thanksgiving
and they are shaming the ones who do. Stores like BJ’s, Gamestop, Home Depot,
Marshalls, Burlington Coat Factory, and even Costco are closing their doors on
Thursday claiming that they are doing so for their employees. A TJ Maxx spokeswoman
even came out to say, "We
consider ourselves an associate-friendly company, and we are pleased to give
our associates the time to enjoy the Thanksgiving holiday with family and
friends.” Regional
electronics chain P.C. Richard & Son took out full-page ads imploring to
"Save Thanksgiving" in newspapers across the Northeast. A survey from
Accenture showed that six out of ten Americans “hate” or “dislike” this
corporate takeover of Thanksgiving, while 45 percent show some capacity of
shopping on the holiday.
Granted,
these companies wouldn’t be opening if they knew nobody would come, but there’s
a reason why the number of people shopping and the number opposing overlap.
Many of us feel entitled to shop whenever we can especially during the holiday
season. I mean, why show how much you love someone on Christmas when you can
easily just get a flat screen for $50? When did possessions become the keystone
to our demonstration of generosity? People are paying the price because of the
disgusting hedonism of our capitalist system and the price is time with loved
ones. The sad thing is that these workers have no choice; the declination of
the shift would, often times, leads to termination. Which brings us back to the
ones who oppose, the 60 percent. Our society has fears: fears of communism,
fears of immigrants, and in this case fear of corporations. Corporations so
large that they can do with us what they will and we have no option but to
oblige. This is the very scary truth of consumerism, but you don’t have to
oblige. You can choose not to go. Organize yourselves and the decrease of Thanksgiving
shopping will show that the company efforts are in vain. We can return the
rights back to the employees and let them have a great Thanksgiving, too.
