Scrooge (Tony Randall as Felix and Jack Klugman as Oscar) from The Odd Couple by ABC Television (eBay item photo front photo back) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
I found a Forbes Magazine study from 2011 that over $450 billion is spent in the USA in the month of December, much of that spurred by “holiday” shopping. And Wikipedia states, “The exchanging of gifts is one of the core aspects of the modern Christmas celebration, making the Christmas season the most profitable time of year for retailers and businesses throughout the world.”
My first Christmas
With the onset of Santa and tinsel in October children begin hounding their parents for presents. Advertisers see children as consumers. And I’m not sure if Christmas is about giving or receiving anymore as much as it is about buying!
Commercialism in retail began well over 100 years ago. And Christmas displays in stores have grown over time. But department stores hosted events such as caroling, living mangers, or Santa’s village with the goal to entice shoppers but in turn made themselves into cultural events through their expressions of Christianity.
I guess that buying and selling and spending have always been a major component of Christmas, as has lamenting the loss of the wonderful white Christmases past. I guess that as children we are not aware of the rampant, repugnant commercialism because we are not interested. Children are innocent and know little about what Christmas costs and why.
Didn’t the Peanuts even denounce commercialism in A Charlie Brown Christmas? Lucy van Pelt decries, “Look, Charlie, let’s face it. We all know that Christmas is a big commercial racket.” That originally aired in 1965.
One of my best friends made a deal with her family this year–when they exchange gifts everything must have been found at a thrift shop! I love that idea. What a creative, affordable, and thoughtful process of giving. So when I see her at Christmas we will exchange gifts that we found at charity resale shops.
The shop-til-you drop phenomenon and media frenzy surrounding it is sickening. Are the lives of Americans so vapid that they have nothing better to do than to line up at Wal-Mart on Thanksgiving Day to be trampled in a Door-Buster special? And don’t even get me started on the companies who opened on Thanksgiving Day, the only uniquely traditional American holiday besides July 4th. Those idiotic Americans with nothing better to do than shop on Thanksgiving have caused tens of thousands of hard working individuals to break themselves away from family, cut that usually guaranteed day off, to work on Thanksgiving night.
It’s no secret that I’m conservative and very pro-capitalism. I’m capitalistic, materialist, all kinds of istics… But I am very unhappy with the corporate assholes who have systematically and unapologetically sucked the meaning and innocence out of the holidays.
I met Santa when I was 3-years-old on Main Street in Jennings…
The company I work for, in attempt to fatten its corporate belly with the anticipated commercial smorgasbord, requires that all stores play Christmas music morning, noon, and night from Thanksgiving to Christmas. But the bigwigs only provide us two Christmas satellite choices, meaning that we hear the same songs in a constant loop all day every day. It is maddening. And honestly, instead of enjoying the magical holiday season of the birth of Jesus Christ, it’s making me hate Christmas. I can’t wait for this crap to end.
Everyone child’s favorite holiday has been reduced to exhausting music loops and mall tramplings. What ever happened to the reason for the season? What ever happened to peace on Earth and goodwill? What ever happened with joy to the world?
Chris Rock made a great reference to the commercialism of Christmas on Saturday Night Live last month. “Now, I don’t know Jesus, but from what I’ve read, Jesus is the least materialistic person to ever roam the Earth. No bling on Jesus! Jesus kept a low profile, and we turned his birthday into one of the most materialistic days of the year.”
“Then at the end of the Jesus birthday season we have the nerve to have an economist come on TV and tell you how horrible the Jesus birthday season was this year,” Rock continued. “’We had a horrible Jesus birthday season this year, hopefully business will pick up by his crucifixion.”