Shame on Wal-Mart

Today Jason alerted me to the story about how an employee at a Wal-mart in NY was trampled to death by a crowd this black Friday morning. It is upsetting how it represents the ridiculous over-commercialization and greed that this holiday has come to represent. Christmas means a whole lot more than shopping and presents, and but I do enjoy giving thoughtful presents to my loved ones during the holiday, and I don't really want to be associated with the crazy violent consumers out there. The article about the violence said that they are reviewing tape at the store and that people will be prosecuted. Personally, I think Wal-Mart should be sued.

Every year you hear about someone getting hurt on Black Friday morning. This is the first time I ever heard of someone getting actually killed. And years ago, I used to think it was just that there are crazy and selfish people out there that are causing these problems, in little isolated cases like lightning striking. That was until a few years ago when I actually decided, for kicks, to go check out a Wal-mart at 5 am on Black Friday for myself, maybe get one of those computer deals for someone on my Christmas list. That experience convinced me that the problem is not so much the customers, but actually the corporate morons at Wal-Mart, and that they are super lucky that there are not more injuries and deaths from their poor management.

Like many stores, Wal-Mart advertises awesome deals on their pages and then tell you that there's only 6 in the store. So, this is not a sale ... this is a contest. A contest of endurance -- how long can you stand outside in the cold? Oh, and, after you stay up all night freezing your butt off, can you keep your cool when someone decides to shove in line ahead of you? And this contest preys on people with little money, people that are the most desperate to have things that they can't afford but that society tells them they ought to have, which might just give them the gumption to shove in line ahead of someone else, thinking that they deserve that tv more. And better yet, if that tv is a gift, I think people are even more likely to shove because they're not doing it for themselves, they're doing it for their kid or their wife or someone else whose eyes they want to light up on Christmas morning.

And I suppose it's fine for Wal-mart to sponsor a "contest" like this to get people into their store, but what they are doing encourages a mob. And they are simply not equipped to handle a mob at their stores. At the NY Wal-mart, the poor victim was an employee who actually got in front of a group of people who broke down the doors to Wal-Mart. The people were upset because they thought they'd seen employees let people in ahead of opening time that hadn't been in line. Poor guy, the employee was not trained to realize that getting in front of an angry crowd would be to put his life on the line. What he needed was tear gas. Or a whole line of people with big padded buttress things and face masks and perhaps clubs. Sure, Wal-Mart will tell you that they are not responsible for people's criminal actions of breaking into stores and act like they are the victims, losing one of their valuable employees ... but for goodness sake, they call their deals "Door-Busters". They are expecting people to be at their door the moment it opens and to run through it. They are expecting a mob. Why are they suprised when one shows up? Why are they not prepared? Wal-mart is criminally negligent.

If you've ever been in a crowd of people moving in one direction, you know that a mob has no brain. The people behind you are pushing the group, trying to elbow out the people behind them, but they have no idea what the people in front are seeing. You are shoulder to shoulder with people. You may have no idea what, or whom, you are stepping on. And if you do realize that you're perhaps stepping on someone -- don't you dare stop, because the person behind you has enough momentum to accidentally push you down, too. It's a powder keg. It's totally scary. When I went to Wal-mart that morning I was expecting us all to walk into Wal-mart one-by-one, perhaps a bit hurriedly, but not as a crushing mob. But there is no one controlling the crowd. They simply open the door. And because there's no crowd control, people cut in line, which aggravates everyone. Once inside, everyone makes a bee-line to electronics, some people running between the clothing racks, knocking things over, only to end up at another bottle-neck -- the entrance to the electronics section. Another mob-crush.

Best Buy, for example, has some "door busters" but half an hour before opening time they send out employees to give coupons to the first people in line for the items they are waiting for. So they "win the contest" without having to run through the door. I believe that since Wal-mart, even after all these injuries, still has not taken action to prevent them, that for them these "runs" on the stores are publicity stunts. And I totally believe that Wal-Mart might actually enjoy the publicity they get when someone is hurt or worse. What better way to advertise -- "Our prices are so low, people are maiming to get them!"

Wal-mart should be sued for inciting riots across the country every year. But instead we always blame the customers. I do think that people need to realize that flat-screen tv's are not worth staying up all night and shoving people around and to lighten up, get some holiday spirit. But Wal-mart needs to take responsibility here for the fact that they are the ones endangering people's lives in order to make a few dollars.