Anyone who reads the Oliver Rawlings Blog knows
that I find modern culture fascinating; some of the things that people do in
the modern world defy belief and they make fascinating subjects to debate and
analyse.
That’s why the American concept of Black Friday
has fascinated me for years. For those of you out there who’ve ever watched an
American Thanksgiving special, you’ll know what Black Friday is. It’s the day after Thanksgiving where
American stores put on the craziest, most aggressive of discounts in order to
draw in the American shopping public. It always works; after all American’s
love a good bargain. It’s basically a day in the year where American companies
find new ways to sell stuff. It is a tradition that has been around for years;
however it’s only been known as Black Friday for the past two decades. It has
now become the most lucrative shopping day of the year.
This is something we’re used to by now; we hear
about it every time this time of year rolls around. What we’re not used to is
Black Friday hitting our stores. Yes, that’s right; we’ve officially been taken
over. It started with Cyber Monday, a similar online tradition to Black Friday
where online retailers offer similar types of deals for customers. That one’s
gained a little traction over here. Now we’ve got Black Friday. Asda, the
supermarket chain owned by American giant Wal-Mart can be particularly noted
for putting on Black Friday offers. People have been practically biting Asda’s
hands off this year to take advantage of these amazing deals.
On the one hand this is certainly a good thing
for our economy. We are only just recovering from the global economic crash
that devastated us all in 2008. Consumerism drives the economy; it always has.
America has benefitted economically from Black Friday for years; the fact it’s
the biggest shopping day of the year means that in this one day alone millions
of dollars are injected into the American market every time Black Friday rolls
around.
However there is a dark
side to it. Every year in America there are always instances of violence
attached to Black Friday, without fail. This year alone there were at least two
incidents on Black Friday across the pond that involved the use of guns. This
year we’ve seen a few incidents of violence here that police have had to come
in and sort out. Consumers can get violent when they really want something. Do
we really want this spreading over to us?