The War on Thanksgiving

Spain Running of the Bulls

How did Thanksgiving evolve from a simple religious ceremony into a violent shopping stampede?…

Spaniards have their Running of the Bulls at Pamplona; Americans have their Stampede of the Shoppers on Black Friday.  Both are high risk, violent sports that frequently end in severe injury or death.  Black Friday falls on the day after Thanksgiving, the day Americans give thanks to the Almighty for all the blessings He has bestowed on His Favorite Nation.  Thanksgiving rituals include over-eating the traditional turkey dinner, welcoming annoying relatives to the table, watching football, and avoiding conversations about politics with crazy, conspiracy-minded family members.  Then, having bowed their heads in thanks for all their material possessions, over-stuffed Americans rush out shopping to get more.  At least a cynic might describe it that way.  How did Thanksgiving evolve from a simple feast shared by the Wampanoag and the Pilgrims in seventeenth century Massachusetts to the shopping extravaganza it is today?

Black Friday shoppers

Thanksgiving was originally a religious ceremony, not connected to a particular day but held whenever a ship landed safely in the New World.  The first on record was in Jamestown in 1610.  The early settlers also held Thanksgiving ceremonies after a good harvest.  But it was the story of the Plymouth Pilgrims and Native Americans feasting together in peace and harmony that captured the later American imagination and is traditionally referred to as The First Thanksgiving.  However, this is no more than an appealing myth obscuring the reality of a violent past.  In his book Mayflower Nathaniel Philbrick tells the true story behind the myth.  They didn’t really eat turkey and the uneasy peace soon exploded into the brutal King Philip’s War, which marked the beginning of the end for Native American control of their own country.  Thanksgiving didn’t become a formal National Holiday until President Lincoln declared it so in 1863 in the midst of the Civil War.  It isn’t quite the Gettysburg Address, but the proclamation nevertheless has an august ring to it:

I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.

What is consistent between the story of the Plymouth Pilgrims and Lincoln’s proclamation is the belief that American history follows a path “consistent with the Divine purposes.”  But how can the modern Thanksgiving shopping frenzy further Divine purposes?  It is hard to imagine any Almighty Deity caring much about the health of the retail economy.  After all, didn’t He tell us at some point to give away all that we have to the poor?

Try telling that to the hordes who descend on shopping malls across the nation on Black Friday.  Many of them are poor.  They are seizing the only opportunity they may have to participate in consumer culture.  For on this day American corporations lure shoppers with very limited numbers of high-end merchandise sold for practically nothing.  Hence the frenzy.  Only the first few in line will get the coveted flat screen TV or video game box or waffle maker or popular toy.  People line up outside for hours, even overnight, and when the doors open the Stampede of the Shoppers begins.  Black Friday horror stories have become as much a part of the Thanksgiving tradition as cranberry sauce or pumpkin pie.  And in the age of smartphones many of the incidents are caught on camera to add dramatic spice to evening newscasts.  The discount chain Walmart is the most popular venue for the Stampedes.  It was their $2 waffle makers that caused a brawl in Little Rock one recent year.  In 2008 a man was trampled to death in the Long Island store and a pregnant woman suffered a miscarriage.  Another Walmart was the scene of an incident that went viral on social media, when a woman used pepper spray to eliminate her rivals in grabbing a video game player.  She was seen on film wielding her weapon and then walking calmly to the checkout leaving a scene of chaos behind.  But the humiliation of being exposed on national TV caused her to turn herself in to police the next day.  In a more serious incident at a Toys R Us two woman fought over a toy, their husbands pulled guns, there was a shootout, and both men died.  Scuffles, knifings, and shootings in the lines that snake through parking lots for hours are commonplace.  But there is something ugly, too, about more well off consumers, sitting smugly at home with their full price flat screens, sneering at the bad behavior of the Walmart shoppers.

I think it’s high time we refocused our outrage from the War on Christmas to the War on Thanksgiving.  After all, it’s Christmas that is responsible for turning Thanksgiving from a day of family togetherness and giving thanks to an orgy of shopping.  Determined to wring the last possible dollar from consumers’ wallets, the Vast Retail Industrial Complex is gobbling up more and more time to expand the Christmas shopping season.  Before we have even celebrated Thanksgiving this year the stores are full of Christmas decorations with the most annoying of Christmas carols piping in the background.  We’ll be thoroughly sick of hearing them by the time Christmas arrives.  I tried to buy some Thanksgiving themed items for my celebration but there were none to be found.  The turkeys and pumpkins have already been swept away and it is Christmas, Christmas everywhere.  This year retailers aren’t waiting for Black Friday morning to open their doors, but encroaching on Thanksgiving Day itself.  They boast of opening on Thanksgiving afternoon.  So before the dishes are even cleared or the turkey gravy has a chance to congeal, the Stampede of the Shoppers will hit the starting line.  I will remain snugly indoors out of harm’s way.  But I’m not immune to the imprecations of the retailers.  I’ll be doing my Christmas shopping online.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! And thanks for everything.  Now, what are you getting me for Christmas?

Rita Byrne Tull is an ex-pat librarian who lives in Maryland.
Share This Post

About Author Profile: Rita Byrne Tull

Rita Byrne Tull is an ex-pat librarian who lives in Maryland.

6 thoughts on “The War on Thanksgiving

  1. george.jansen55@gmail.com'
    George
    November 27, 2013 at 13:28

    “But there is something ugly, too, about more well off consumers, sitting smugly at home with their full price flat screens, sneering at the bad behavior of the Walmart shoppers.”

    So, if I question your description of the well-off consumers, I suppose that I’m sneering at you sneering at them. More commenters can attack me or in any case the post above theirs, and we can be busy until Christmas. With a bit of research on back postings, I could probably do a fair sketch of first 10 posts myself.

    I think, though, that the problem with the flat screens is not the struggle to buy them Friday morning or the smugness of having paid full price. The problem is that it brings one TV news, which would rather have one two-headed calf than all the one-headed cattle of Texas. Jerry Springer is not an anomaly on TV, he is the epitome of it.

    “I think it’s high time we refocused our outrage from the War on Christmas to the War on Thanksgiving.”

    One of the truly finest things about this great land of ours is the eagerness with which we urge the world to repent of sins we have no interest in committing. The schedule of sins varies dramatically, but the eagerness is at the same level from the most fundamentalist backwoods chapel to the toniest church in an urban center. I therefore prescribe Rita a couple of decades for beating up on the Yanks, but aim to repent my own snottiness in new silk and old sack.

  2. Worm
    November 27, 2013 at 16:21

    give it 20 years and they’ll have these stampedes for easter, halloween, etc etc

    oh, they won’t – because we’ll all be hooked up to some kind of Amazon mainframe that will automatically purchase individual cornflakes every time we blink

  3. bugbrit2@live.com'
    November 27, 2013 at 17:55

    I’m not going shopping again until Monday.

    And the radio is banned until all ‘ALL CHRISTMAS!!’ radio stations are a memory. Its Messiah on the iPod from now until Boxing Day.

  4. johngjobling@googlemail.com'
    malty
    November 27, 2013 at 18:43

    Wiesbaden’s Walmart was odd, only existed because of the large American presence at Frankfurt Airport and Ramstein, sort of a seventh cavalry outpost in hostile territory. The store was full of, er, Americans, made Primark seem like Harrods except, it had one of the finest delis in Hessen, was well worth an expedition. Never saw any signs of rioting, at least not what we Tynesiders would call a riot. Perhaps the black Friday revellers could learn a thing or two from Apple’s latest trinket acolyte’s (motto.. patsy’s of the world unite as we queue tonight.)

  5. peter.burnet@hotmail.com'
    Peter
    November 28, 2013 at 13:07

    One of the nice things about being Canadian and watching all this madness below us is that it’s so easy to tell ourselves that our own consumer excess and frantic compulsive shopping is actually measured, civilized and tasteful.

    The Canadian Thanksgiving is in early October, for obvious reasons. Every year I am in awe that our neighbours indulge in such a frenzy of feasting, turkey, drinking, travel, shopping and football, only to do it all again less than a month later.

    Great post, Rita.

    The Canadian Thanksgiving is in early October, for obvious reasons. Every year I am in awe that our neighbours indulge in such an intense frenzy of travel, feasting, drinking, turkey, shopping and football, only to do it all over again less than a month later.

    Great post, Rita.

  6. Douglas
    December 2, 2013 at 19:49

    The real shame of Thanksgiving in America is that anyone should have to work at a retail job on the holiday itself, or the day after. That’s why we steer clear of the Black Friday sales in my family.

    As an armchair historian (forgive me), I do want to take exception to one thing you wrote, Rita:

    “However, this is no more than an appealing myth obscuring the reality of a violent past. In his book ‘Mayflower’ Nathaniel Philbrick tells the true story behind the myth. They didn’t really eat turkey and the uneasy peace soon exploded into the brutal King Philip’s War…”

    While it’s true that the Plymouth “thanksgiving” was a sedate affair, it’s a stretch to suggest that the Black Friday of King Philip’s War “exploded” immediately thereafter. King Philip’s War occurred 50+ years later (in the 1670s) and was fought primarily by second and third generation colonists. One of the things that Philbrick teases out rather effectively is the mostly respectful relations of the first generation Plymouth colonists with the natives in comparison to those of succeeding generations or to their neighbors in Massachusetts Bay.

Comments are closed.