rustyroger

Just being watching the early news.
It seems we have embraced Black Friday, the police had been called to some big stores to restore order, fights had broken out in some of them as people tried to bag a bargain.

We don't celebrate Thanksgiving, does Canada?. If not do the Canadians have a Black Friday?.

When we start celebrating July 4th then I know we will have lost the War of Independence.

Roger.

Ozzie

My understanding is that the Canadians do Thanksgiving on the second Monday in October (a National holiday?) linking it to the European traditions connected with a bountiful harvest.
I'm saddened to hear that the Brits have also caught the Black Friday virus. It seems that it has also spread to Canada. In the U.S. it is a wild display of mercantilism. The newspapers, e-mail in-boxes, etc. are swollen with ads inviting all to participate. One must endure traffic congestion, long lines of humans, and take care not to be trampled by the herd when the store's doors are opened. While some prices are good, I'm wondering if it is really worth all of the trouble. Perhaps I am just getting old, but I am also becoming a "bah-humbug" person.

sammy

[I]yup, we celebrate Thanksgiving...national holiday...and yes Black Friday has hit us also. I stay as far away from it as possibleI think the term is dreadful...I wait for Boxing Day sales.

garys 68&72

You're missing out on the fireworks!
Is there anything not made better by explosives?

sammy

We have fireworks July 1, to celebrate Canada Day...

pogo69

Thanksgiving...growing up as an early adult if i ever said i was leaving the house to go shopping i would of been smacked...it was a day if you were able and fortunate enough to be with family and friends period. in spite of the fact that the actual holiday arose from killing the indians and stealing their corn, but i guess its still better than the way it celebrated today, by ''hurry up and eat,,,lets go to walmart'

pogo69

eventually black friday will 'start' the friday after forth of july

oldcutlass

I wish we'd go back to the way it was when I was young. It was a day spent with family and friends. Stores were closed, and football was the main adult entertainment on the agenda.

stan 65 cutlass

i just cant believe how early christmas starts now, right after halloween, back in the day it wasnt until the middle of dec until you started to see decorations and lights. pretty sad its all for the sales now

Nilsson

America Inc, as we are owned by big business. Lets face it, Christmas as we know it was invented by the Corporations.

oldsmobiledave

We celebrate Thanksgiving but it is not on the same day. Canadian Thanksgiving is in October. These so called bargain sales days have nothing to do with being thankful. The only reason the sales madness sread into Canada was because of cross border shopping that increased greatly while the Canadian dollar was @ parity with the US dollar (actually it was above for years). Now that the Can $ is settled in at 88 cents the cross border madness has weakened but the silly sales continue.

Bernhard

Well said

Look at weddings its all about the show

z11375ss

The Holidays don't start for me until I say they do. Fight and scratch to save 100 bucks on a TV? Come on. Just ignore the tripe. Sit quietly with family and enjoy life. These people are nuts!

FMB42

Fortunately, my wife and I have never really been the type to be lured into thinking we have to go out shopping for sales the day after Thanksgiving. And we long ago quit the big and often insult riddled "family" holiday dinners and the like. We just have a small and relatively quiet dinner for two followed by her watching various holiday shows and me spending time out in the garage.

Swede64

Black friday have spread even further, it has reached Sweden since a couple of years.

lshlsh2

I refuse to go shopping on Thanksgiving, had family over for turkey and watched some football. I think people should rebell from working on thanksgiving/christmas!

Besides I am a guy. Any guy should be able to do all his christmas shopping in less than an hour on Dec. 24th.

Larry

oldcutlass

Ohhhhhhhh, now I see what your talking about Roger, just read how some of your stores incorporated an American tradition, Black Friday, of fighting over bargains. You Brits need to watch what you wish for.

Mike77

Santa as it is depicted in modern advertising was invented by Coke a Cola. Seems to have taken over the true meaning of Christmas as practiced by Christians. The two are polar opposites. Not sure how the corporation managed to push out the Christians. Money seems to be the answer. And you know what the Christians say about the "love of money leads to........the root of all evil"
Modern society sure is an enigma.
Mike

MDchanic

The funny thing is that Thanksgiving is a holiday that (in the US, at least) was derived from traditions of the Puritan refugees from England, who specifically did not celebrate Christmas, which they believed was a thinly disguised Heathen holiday, befouled by drinking and carousing, and celebration of which they banned in their colonies.

Christmas was just like every other day in Puritan New England, under penalty of law, while nearby in places like New York, it was a drunken festival.

Now, who really cares when or where it all came from, as long as we can get to the mall and shop, right?

- Eric

rustyroger

We have Guy Fawkes Night on November 5th.
Celebrating the burning at the stake of the fall guy of a plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament, It was a big deal when I was a small boy, fireworks and a big bonfire. Back in a time when we had jumping crackers and hand held sparklers, it was assumed parents would actually look after their kids back then.
But firework displays happen all the time now, and Halloween has displaced Guy Fawkes as the big deal. I'd never heard of Halloween until I was 11 years old. I think it a shame different nations don't observe their traditional festivals, nowadays it seems in my travels I'm just going from one part of Globalconsumerism inc. to another.

I'm pleased to find you guys seem to broadly agree with me, clearly Oldsmobile enthusiasts are blessed with better taste and manners than average.

Roger.

m371961

Now Guy Fawkes is used here to promote anarchy and civil unrest.

Railguy

I always thought it would be funny to put on knee and elbow pads and a helmet.Then run ahead of those "shoppers"when the doors open,the way they do with the bulls in spain.Every years my wife asks me to go along.I don't want to even admit I belong to the same species.
railguy

rustyroger

Maybe arm the shoppers beforehand, it could be a useful way to clear out the gene pool..........

Roger.

FMB42

This reminds me of the people I'd see camping out in front of a local movie theater at 6:30am while I was driving to work. This was back in '02 or '03 when some new movie was due to hit the theaters.