Now that the snow is here, and Christmas music is being piped into
sound systems in every store, there is the "traditional" mad rush to buy
gifts. The excesses of Black Friday are probably the best symbol of
consumerism gone rampant-- fed by the advertising industry and based on
the premise that buying more is better. On the one hand, I understand
this. Retailers are still feeling the effects of the recession, and
they especially count on Christmas spending to pump up their bottom
line. But I find the advertising starts earlier and earlier each year,
and the ads get more crass. (Witness the ad where the salesclerk is
piling more and more electronics on a lady who is trying to find gifts
for her nieces and nephews and would have to have Bill Gates's income to
afford all that stuff!)
Maybe we should take a small
step back and enjoy precious time spent with our families rather than seeing how much
we can buy for people who probably already have a lot of stuff. Not a
new theme certainly, but one that bears consideration in the face of all
this pressure to spend...
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