Dreamin' of a Black Friday

From the looks of the news reports, I may be the only person in America who doesn't observe "Black Friday" as a high holiday. Maybe it's because, shopping complete,  I get to spend the day wrapping the gifts I've already purchased and addressing my Christmas cards.

Friday night, I watched with horror as the news channels all showed shots of mobs - there is no other word for it - at big box stores storming in to grab flat-panel TVs and Tickle-me-Xtreme Elmos. It's amazing no one was trampled to death at this "running of the bargains." Who knows, they still might find a couple of bodies kicked under the shelves at Best Buy, clutching their newspaper flyers.

Lord knows that "buying stuff" has long been our true national religion, and the malls our new cathedrals. That makes Black Friday kind of a Holy Day of shopping obligation. I wonder if it's mortally sinful not to have hit the stores for a bit that day?

I understand that Black Friday is meant to signal the day when retailers start getting into "the black" for the year, so a Black Friday that's kind of gray-ish black may well mean that the year will end badly. But a lot of this strikes me as self-fulfilling. If there was less hype around Black Friday, there'd be less panic if the numbers for that one day weren't hit.  Fewer "prices slashed even further" (which can only put a store deeper in the red, no?).  Less market hysteria, fewer market dives (oh, no, Wal-Mart didn't move everything off its shelves...If they can't sell, then I must sell off).

Spreading the spending expectation out over a couple of weeks might  make things a lot saner.

Or how about this for an idea: encourage the retail giants who now rise and fall on Black Friday (and its Shopping 2.0 bro, "Cyber Monday") to go on a fiscal year that starts, say, October 1st. That way, the holiday spending could be managed a little better. Retailers would have 9 entire months to make up for a sluggish holiday shopping season.

Nah, it'll never happen. We're way too invested in the rush and hype that has people lining up a day in advance to storm the aisles in search of whatever it is that, for one day at least, will make everything all better.