I’m begging sane
people to avoid the term “Cyber Monday.” In fact, after finishing this blog
post, I promise that I’ll never speak it again either. I only wish that
television reporters would vow to do the same.
Every newscast
that I checked this morning had a segment on this bogus holiday. CNN taught Cyber
Monday preparation tips; FOX 25 News applauded folks for buying useless junk in
this collapsing economy.
I’ve been
thinking about shopping in the past few days since, on the morning after
Thanksgiving with my family back in Queens, I woke up to screaming police
sirens and low flying news choppers.
My aunt, uncle,
and cousin live just blocks from the Green Acres Mall – a spot that was once
locally infamous for moviegoers’ tendencies to fire at the screen, but that has
now won national notoriety for its Wal-Mart customers’ trampling a store worker
in their deadly quest for discount electronics.
It’s never
settling to be so close to such hysterical ignorance. I know that New Yorkers
are known for being rude and angry, but this was extreme. No doubt I’d be lambasting
hicks and rednecks if this happened in the Midwest,
so I’ll give it to my people here: You’re a bunch of damn Neanderthals.
For once I feel
little need to extrapolate on a tragic situation; anyone who can’t figure on
their own that it’s problematic when someone is senselessly murdered for
material objects probably supports the Iraq war and doesn’t read The
Phoenix anyway.
Still, with the
dangers posed by stupid, selfish people physically shopping at stores, one might
expect me to support Cyber Monday – which, the National Retail Association wants
us to believe, is the day when we all log on and spend big.
But I don’t
support this pseudo event, and, more so, I’m worried that it might start appearing
on calendars. The term was forged by Shop.org in 2005 and already it’s a staple
in our annual fluff news cycle.
My apprehension
might seem crazy, but I wish more people had opposed Hallmark’s forcible ushering
of Mother’s Day and Father’s Day into our consciousness. The same goes for
Secretary’s Day; at first we might have laughed, but now receptionists abound
(just like those greedy moms and dads) expect cards and candy.
In the least, if
we must have made up holidays, I would appreciate some fun ones. How about Internet
Porn Thursday or Question 2sday? Cyber Monday is a lazily named, obnoxiously
superficial rallying call, and it should be trimmed from the American lexicon
before it goes the way of “Black Friday.”
It’s time to stand
up for ourselves and rage against consumer culture. So unless you’re looking
for sweet deals from North Face and Amazon, which you can find here, please
join me in the boycott that I’ll be joining right after I buy this
exceptionally priced Sony MP3 player.
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