Know Your Limits
You can find the best bargains of the year on Black Friday at Wal-Mart, but it’s time to take a step back and reevaluate the real worth of flat screen TVs, tech gadgets, Hannah Montana gear, and payday loans. Saving money is a great thing, and shopping for sale and clearance items is one of the best ways to save money, especially if you are going to have to buy those items anyway. However, there are limits when it comes to saving money. If you steal a t-shirt instead of buying it, you are going to save money, but that’s not right either. The holiday season makes it easy to focus on material goods, and people get so caught up in the doorbuster deals of Black Friday that selfishness reigns supreme. It seems as though some shoppers in New York put the value of saving money over the value of human life.
Wal-Mart Worker’s Tragic Death
This Black Friday, doorbuster deals were literally worth busting down the doors, at least in one New York Wal-Mart. People lined up for the 5 a.m. opening to be the first shoppers in the store. One of this year’s best deals was a 50-inch Samsung HD Plasma television, priced at under $800. The shoppers were so anxious to get inside that they actually took the doors off the hinges. As soon as the doors came off, all hell broke loose. The shoppers charged into the store with only one thing on their minds—Black Friday Bargains. Amidst the frenzy, a 34-year-old worker was knocked over and trampled to death. Shoppers at this New York Wal-Mart were so consumed with saving a few hundred dollars that an innocent man lost his life.
The Real Value of Doorbuster Deals
As previously mentioned, smart shopping and saving money are to be commended. If you can save a few hundred dollars on a flat-screen TV by getting to your local retailer earlier than the rest of the world, by all means, do it. If you can get tremendous deals on the many other must-haves of the holiday shopping season like TVs, tech toys, and Hannah Montana gear, you should. The less money you spend on holiday shopping this year, the better, but an outstanding Black Friday deal should not cause the loss of sanity, loss of money, and most importantly, the loss of life.
A Good Deal Isn’t Always a Good Deal
Black Friday sales have prices you can go crazy over, but that doesn’t mean you should lose all connections with reality. You hear about people getting in fights over the last item or, now, the man who was trampled under the herd of stampeding shoppers. Is a good bargain really worth getting in a fight? Payday loans can help you take advantage of a good bargain; it is definitely not worth killing someone. Those shoppers in New York were so wrapped up in getting their hands on the cheapest items, that they lost all sense of consideration and compassion. Customers continued to rush into the store while paramedics were trying to resuscitate the victim. It doesn’t sound like those TVs were such a great deal.
A good deal also isn’t a good if you can’t afford the sale price in the first place. If a flat screen TV is $500 dollars off, but still costs $1000 and you can’t afford it, it’s not a good deal. This holiday season is about living within your means. There’s no point in buying something that’s on sale, if you can’t afford to cover your usual monthly expenses. If you’re having trouble covering bills in between paychecks, you’ll realize that payday loans are a much better value than a discounted flat-screen TV.
This is so tragic. There are many horrible things going on these days and for someone to die over a shopping frenzy is just insane.
I wounder if the family of the man who died is going to be having second thoughts about the value of material possessions. I know I am.
To say that material things is more of value than a mans life is an understatement.
My prayers go out for the family of this man.
I also pray that the shoppers who couldn’t control
their selfishness relive in heir minds what happen. then ask if a mans life was worth the bargains they bought and are they going to enjoy
them this year, for a higher price was paid and it can not be returned for a refund.
i been shopping for the last 25 yrs on black friday and every year walmart gets worse it was an utter chaos this year they have no organazation at all kmart use to give a number out at the jewerly counter and this seems to work i myself got hit by a walmart enployee this year because she jumped some boxes to make sure no one unwraped the stuff in electronic about 1000 people were line up coming from all sides to buy what few pieces they had stached behind the cash register they were acting like savages to gets these items at wal mart knows this is going to happen to my opinion they dont take precautions and no organizing walmart should take a lot of the blame too
PRAYERS TO THE FAMILY
I used to work at Walmart and once on Black Friday. There is no holiday spirit on this day and the Walmart managers literally had $$ in their eyes. Try being a cashier on this day, the customers become savages and at least one cashier, namely me, felt like I was being trampled by customers and left to the wolves by supervisors and managers. 15 minute break after 2 hours of savage customers, what brake? If you have Hypoglycemia, don’t be a Walmart cashier, you could pass out and go into a coma before the supervisor finally relents into giving you a 15 or even a 10 minute break. If Sam Walton could see how his company is being run, he would turn over in his grave. Everyone wants a kind and friendly cashier, but hardly anyone, including management, wants to give kindness and respect to the cashiers who try their best to make their customers happy. The Christmas Spirit has deteriorated into Christmas comercialism at Walmart.
This is just horrible. I worked retail for 5 years and Black Friday got worse every year. I think Wal-mart should look at their security cameras and file suit against the people who knocked that poor guy down. They might have shiny new TV’s this Christmas, but that guys family has nothing but grief for Christmas.
Black Friday’s can be hectic! That’s why I wait till late in the afternoon to go, (if I’m not working), chances are it won’t be as packed. That was a very unfortunate thing to happen to that guy and my condolences go out to his family. This really could have happened at any store but with it seeming to be a pattern at WalMart, or a starting to be a pattern, maybe some precautions should be made for next year.
This is clearly the point at which it is obvious that we as a culture have taken materialism too far. Innocent people should not die, shouldn’t even get hurt, just so a few more people can buy some Miley Cyrus adorned plastic trinket or a new TV.
It is tragic that this happened but it is also tragic that it is being blamed on not enough crowd control. Why does a store have to control a crowd coming in to shop. It is all of our responsibilty to act humanely. That is like saying a store or school is at fault for a gunman coming in and doing harm. Oh yeah the sue happy people of the world do say that so they can get something for their heartache. Don’t misunderstand I have had loss too but would never accept or expect something from an entity that had nothing to do with others inhuman acts. We live in a world of placing blame and passing on any responsibilty and it is time that we all look at ourselves for what this world has become. To the past Walmart employee it is not law to give you a break after 2hrs and if you are hypoglycemic as I am you don’t need to eat every 2hrs you have to eat properly all the time in order to stay in control. Also it is the job of the manager to have dollar signs in their eyes so they keep their job, your job and the store open. As with any company it has to watch it’s bottom line in order to stay in business. As Bonnie said the people were acting like savages not Walmart or Kmart or any other store that has Black Friday that acts this way it is the shoppers and they are the only people that should be blamed for any mishaps that happen. As all too often happens though they, the stores etc, will be sued and will have to pay out and all costs will go up. then we will complain about the cost of goods and services and look for a way we can take advantage of the system. As you can see one can go on forever and it will lead into the next thing and the next. So as I said before we all need to start looking at ourselves and that is the only way change will come.
this is truley tragic ,walmart should be sued also
hi
i karm
hi iam sandy i thing its true