The big thing around here this weekend, is this poor guy who got trampled too death at WalMart recently by Holiday Shoppers. I don’t know how many emails I have received on this in the past 72 hours.
Being as it is a slow weekend, and I have not been mauled recently or had my bones picked over like carrion lying on the floor of Death Valley, I will take the shot. This deadly holiday shoppin is getting out of hand ladies, someone needs to cool it. When people are actually dying for a cheap pair of shoes in America, it is time to draw the line.
The name for this apparently deadly rite of fall ritual in America, is known as “Black Friday” which is the day after the day before and someone evidently is going to die. And they think that deer hunting in Wisconsin is bad news?
Women desperate for a sale, will buy anything. I remember one year, Cup Cake came home with an escalator! Another year she shows up with a jock strap! I kid you not. So I say, “What the hell are we going to do with that.” She smiles and says, “it was on sale. I will figure something out.” Today it is in our kitchen, she uses it to store garlic balls!
Bad shopper, bad, bad, shopper.
God Bless America — A thirty-something woman is never slender enough, a credit limit is never fat enough. Yesterday in a frenzy to load up on more stuff, a temporary worker at WalMart was thrown to the floor and then literally trampled too death. Have we sunk this low in our quest for even more made in China junk?
Evidently so.
So what are the effects of over-consumption for many years? The more you have the more you want, which of course leads to unhappiness and insecurity often initiated in the quest for wealth. I recently read a study on this. It mainly dealt with kids, in these three studies with adolescents, they showed that those with aspirations for wealth and fame were more depressed and had lower self-esteem than peers whose aspirations centered on self-acceptance, family and friends, and community feeling.
“The wealth seekers also had a higher incidence of headaches, stomach-aches and runny noses, people with extrinsic goals sharpen their egos to conquer the “outer space’ around them, but they don’t have a clue how to navigate inner space.”
Too Much Stuff.
We lose control of our own lives when we surrender long-term wealth (like the natural systems that support us and literally ground us) in exchange for short-term bargains (like cheap socks and burgers). Certainly, it can’t be denied that as a percentage of income, we have the cheapest (and fastest) food in the world. But we also have the most expensive health care.
What’s the connection?
The painful truth is it’s very expensive to treat a feverish lifestyle that tears up the environment, creates chronic stress, and invents strange new forms of food. Because of our culture’s frantic, conveyor-belt consumption, we spend more for garbage bags than 90 of the world’s countries spend for everything! (it’s normal for us to buy a wastebasket and carry it home in a plastic bag, then take the basket out of the bag, and put the bag in the basket.)
Seventy percent of Americans visit malls each week, more than attend houses of worship.
Each year more than a million Americans file for personal bankruptcy – more than graduate from college. We spend more on shoes, jewelry, and watches ($80 billion) than on higher education ($65 billion). We can do so much better, if we redistribute our wealth.
Here’s the dilemma: Even in hard times, we’ve programmed our economy for surplus rather than sufficiency. We produce more than we need. One of the greatest underlying stresses we’re feeling is “How can we possibly consume all this stuff?” But every time that thought crosses our minds, a mental game-show buzzer sounds and the program takes over, instructing us to “keep eating, keep shopping.”
The truth is, maybe we just can’t eat anymore. Truth is, maybe we just have too much stuff.
Well, I would like to stay and chat some more girl, but like I said, “I need to get to my leaf blower that is tucked wayyyyyyyyyyyy back in a corner of the garage, buried under all my stuff.”
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