He died to save our economy
Published by punkass marc November 28th, 2008 in Punkass!Good ol’ America. Land of the free, best country in the world, everyone wishes they were us.
The thing I like most about America is our restrained consumerism.
A Wal-Mart worker died after being trampled when hundreds of shoppers smashed through the doors of a Long Island store Friday morning, police and witnesses said.
The 34-year-old worker, employed as an overnight stock clerk, tried to hold back the unruly crowds just after the Valley Stream store opened at 5 a.m.
We really have our priorities, straight, you know? Like, everyone else in the world’s singularly obsessed with $89 digital cameras and $600 HDTVs, but we keep our focus on what really matters in life.
How do I know that? Because we’re always quick to help a soul in need.
Witnesses said the surging throngs of shoppers knocked the man down. He fell and was stepped on. As he gasped for air, shoppers ran over and around him.
“He was bum-rushed by 200 people,” said Jimmy Overby, 43, a co-worker. “They took the doors off the hinges. He was trampled and killed in front of me. They took me down too…I literally had to fight people off my back.”
We’re also a nation of sacrifice. Here we are, in the midst of a deep recession-slash-depression, and this thoughtful soul gave his life so that needy multi-national corporations from around the world might see less of a downtick on their 4th quarter earnings reports.
I’m just glad no one slowed down to pick him up. There are only like 20 hours of shopping time on Black Friday and any wasted time could mean a crying kid at home and doom for our economy.
America. We’ve got it alllllll figured out.
At this point, I think Black Friday must be our equivalent of a sacrifice to a god. The sales this year weren’t even that good, and people went nuts.
*shurgs* Something is wrong with us.
I was at a walmart this morning (mainly because I gave my sister a ride to word at 4am an secondly I was after 2 items) and I’m so glad it wasn’t one of those stores that closed the night before. Stores that close the night before ALWAYS have lines around them (I saw a Toy R Us that had a line going down the street) and those are almost always the ones where fights break out and people get hurt or killed.
The walmat I was in never closed the night before and even let customers in the store before the 5am sale…they just didn’t activate the sale prices til 5am. Yes it was crowded and there were people literally cutting the plastic wrap off the pallets to get the items in their possession before 5am. but there was no violence. On a funny side note the stategy seemed to be to get all your items and then get in line before the sale actually started at 5am. By 5am every single one of the 20 checkout lines was full.
But to be killed because a crowd of shoppers were more concerned about a sale than a person’s life? They say you can’t put a price on a person’s life. Apparently its worth about whatever items the people were after when they trampled that man to death.
Oh, and don’t take that comment as minimizing. I meant that as a general statement of Black Friday, not the extreme versions. My thoughts are for the family of the man killed.
Wow. And not in a good way…can’t come up w/ anything more right now…other than the obvious ‘that is really fucked up’.
Totally. Insane.
I feel validated as a misanthrope. I hate being right about that.
TRH
If there is one bright spot in this horrible story it is the dozens of Wal-mart employees who bravely tried to save the man.
When I last saw a headline for this story on CNN, it was directly above one that said “Black Friday sales up 3 percent”. Now that’s some dark, dark comedy for you.
The gods are pleased.
Just one more reason I hate Christmas.
When I last saw a headline for this story on CNN, it was directly above one that said “Black Friday sales up 3 percent”. Now that’s some dark, dark comedy for you.
Great. And it only took the sacrifice of a few innocent employees/shoppers to the gods in order to get that 3%
Mammon, presumably.
This story is sickening.
Beyond the background sickness of the Chrsitmas shopping mania, there is the direct culpability of WalMart and other stores that hype this kind of frenzy and attract these mobs.
On the upside, prices for recycled materials have crashed - fallen by half - the Chinese aren’t buying recycled plastic and metal to make the crap we no longer are buying.
The man who was killed at Wal-Mart, by no one in particular, was a temporary employee. He wasn’t really employed by Wal-Mart. The company wouldn’t give that type of job to one of it’s own, because it might be too much of an insurance risk.