‘And so this is Christmas, and what have we done?’

A Commentary by Doug Draper

First came the chilly November nights camping out in tents. Then came the pepper spray.

One Christmas yard scene. photo by Doug Draper

The faces of those who were peppered, according to all the reports I read in so many mainstream newspaper from Toronto to Boston and New York, turned red going on purple as their eyes watered up and the sting in their throats caused them to cough violently. “Call an ambulance! Call an ambulance,” one of them yelled as others turned to flee.

You might think I am talking about Occupy Wall Street or one of its many follow-up encampments, there to protest a widening wage gap and other economic injustices in cities and towns across the continent, but I am not. Shockingly enough (if we are capable of being shocked by anything anymore in this mad-going –on-madder culture today) I am talking about ‘Black Friday’ – a day that exploded a week ago this past Friday for our American neighbours and for a growing number of Canadians as the official kick-off to the Christmas shopping season.

Aside from the pepper spray – one of this year’s more novel twists around an escalating level of violence – there have been escalating of violence over the past 20 or so years over people punching and throwing others through store windows, not just in the U.S. but in Canada, if only to get their mitts on a Cabbage Patch Dolls, etc. There were numerous other reports this past Black Friday of brawls, bloody noses and trampling of store patrons this past Black Friday. There was even a report of someone shot outside a store by armed robbers who decided it is now far easier to wait in the parking lot with guns than camp in front for days for that half-priced TV or whatever it is.

The person that pepper-sprayed others at a Wal-Mart store in the Los Angeles, California area wanted to be among the first to get her gloves on a discounted Xbox video game. In a statement following that highly publicized incident, a spokesperson for Wal-Mart stores was reported saying there were “a few unfortunate incidents” but that things were “safe” at most of the retailer’s more than 4,000 outlets across the continent.

Things were mostly safe? Why does anyone even have to say that when we are talking about Christmas holiday shopping, for God sake?  I don’t know, I just turned 60 recently and maybe I am out of it. Maybe I don’t know that Christmas shopping, as one shopper was reported saying this past week, almost requires wearing a bulletproof vest and gas mask these days.

I remember when shopping in stores at Christmas used to be kind of magical and not a combat mission.  But again, that was many, many years ago and I was so much younger then and Christmas seemed a little more peaceful and one whole hell of lot less carnivorous in the shopping department.

Christmas has always been somewhat of a commercial holiday, but surely there must be limits.

There must be limits that speak to the meaning of the John Lennon song ‘Happy Xmass (War Is Over)’ when he sings; “So this is Christmas and what have we done?”

What we have done is turn Christmas into a bit of a manure pile of consumer consumption and that is too bad.

Consuming at Christmas is apparently our job, however. There are already reports that in the United States and in Canada people are tramp0ling over each other in the stores to get the job of Christmas. In a front-page report this past November 28 in USA Today, it was featured that holiday sails hit record highs. “This year’s sales were up $52 billion compared to $45 billion last year. And isn’t that dandy?

Why, on earth, should anyone take seriously  the 99  percent of us who are carping about our heating bills. etc., if we are spending record amounts at Christmas.

If we are making less, shouldn’t we be spending less?

What is wrong with us? Why can’t we have a Christmas where we simply enjoy our time together with family and friends, and don’t feel we have to swamp the shopping malls for whatever. Can’t we be happy just giving our loved ones and friends one or two nice gifts that they may remember from us long into the future than fill space below the tree with a lot of plastic crap?

Surely we can get back to giving gifts that matter again instead of those we have to fight through mad crowds to give. Christmas should be a time of peace, love and giving, and not a time of stress and beating each other up in shopping malls.

Let’s mellow out and take the peace of Christmas back for all of us – for you and me and our families. Surely we can do that. Can’t we? Can’t we???

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