Sure, Thanksgiving is right around the corner. But after giving thanks and gratitude for abundance with family and friends thousands of people across the country head out to big-box stores, malls and online to shop their way into oblivion on the infamous Black Friday.
Black Friday, one of the biggest shopping day of the year, falls the day after Thanksgiving. This tradition has been growing each year: stores open earlier on Black Friday, while others open on Thanksgiving evening to give shoppers a head start. And as shoppers move more online, retail outlets have tried to keep up, offering Black Friday deals all weekend (and even longer) and extra special offers all season long.
But what if we tried to enjoy the spirit of the season without shopping? Welcome to Buy Nothing Day, a campaign started by AdBusters to encourage shoppers to opt-out of the Black Friday shenanigans.
Buy Nothing Day is an international day of protest celebrated internationally this year on November 27 against excessive consumption and the unrestrained shopping frenzy of the holiday season. The website encourages us to take back our sanity by buying nothing on purpose:
“In a world where every inch of the capitalist system is bullying you into submission, can you resist? When advertisers hound you day and night, can you escape? This Black Friday, a massive, absurd, and destructive consumerist machine will coordinate against you for one simple reason – to convince you to max out your credit card to buy shit you dont need so that a broken system stays afloat. So when they say ‘BUY!’, will you say NOTHING!?
Buy Nothing Day is legendary for instigating this type of personal transformation as you suddenly remember what real living is all about you sense an upsurge of radical empowerment [as you join] Join millions of us in over 60 countries on November 28/29 and see what it feels like. Then, after Buy Nothing Day, take the next step for generations, Christmas has been hijacked by commercial forces this year, lets take it back.”
You can choose to be a more conscious consumer on Black Friday/Buy Nothing Day by opting out of the shopping madness (and dangers!) by taking on these 10 things to do instead of shopping.
1. Get outside! Legendary outdoor gear store REI is closing this year to encourage their employees to get outside, and you should too. Nature is good for our body, mind and spirit, so take advantage of the day off and go wander.
2. If you’re going outside, get yourself to water. Research shows that water can help us feel calm and collected, and can reset our brain after stress.
3. Make a gift: Instead of spending your day shopping for the perfect gift, why not make it? Find crafty ways to recycle, upcycle and make the perfect gift for your loved ones.
4. Cook some food: Nothing says love like homemade foods, whether you’re cooking for yourself or others. Do some meal planning or batch cooking, or try out some new recipes for your holiday parties.
5. Learn something new: Read a book about a new topic, try online courses for cooking or language development, or build your skills for food photography (this is what I will be doing!).
6. Practice mindfulness: The holiday season is arguably the most hectic season of all… if you let it become so. Learn some simple mindfulness techniques to help keep you grounded during these months.
7. Plan a trip: Give yourself something to look forward to in the upcoming months by planning a small road trip or an epic adventure.
8. Have a dance party: Most of your friends are probably off work, so why not throw a dance party? Get everybody moving joyfully to boost happiness and celebrate community.
9. Phone home: Whether your loved ones are near or far, give them an actual call, Skype or Facetime to let them know you love them and wish them a happy holiday season.
10. Do NOTHING! When was the last time you allowed yourself to lounge in bed, drink coffee, read the news, or just nap? Taking time off is important to help ourselves truly relax.
If you do choose to shop on Black Friday (or any day), ask yourself a few questions before purchasing an item. Care2 blogger Dave Chameidesencourages consumers to ask10 questions before buying anything:
Whatever you decide to do this Black Friday, choose to do so mindfully to fully engage (or disengage) with the season as you wish!
Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.
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10 Things to Do Instead of Shopping to Celebrate Buy Nothing Day
Mother Jones
Appearances to the contrary, I might be getting better this morning. Cross your fingers, and we’ll see how things go tomorrow.
Our hummingbird babies are fully mobile! I took some pictures of them this morning, and when I carefully edged in for a slightly closer angle they took off like a shot. This was plainly not their maiden voyage. They’re all grown up now. Sniff.
In other news, longtime readers will remember that I once blogged about Louis the cathedral cat after a visit to Wells Cathedral in 2008. He was very friendly. However, in one of those inevitable town-gown controversies, Louis is now being accused of attacking dogs in the nearby area. But it might just be a case of mistaken identity: “I’ve heard there is another ginger cat around at the moment,” said one witness, “and it’s quite possible that it’s him attacking dogs. We don’t know for sure whether or not Louis was involved. Louis had definitely been in the shop just before the incident happened outside, but it could have been a different cat.”
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I would like to nominate this for least surprising headline of the year:
And it gets even better. This is unusually straightforward reporting:
House Republicans called it streamlining, empowering states or “achieving sustainability.” They couched deep spending reductions in any number of gauzy euphemisms.
What they would not do on Tuesday was call their budget plan, which slashes spending by $5.5 trillion over 10 years, a “cut.” The 10-year blueprint for taxes and spending they formally unveiled would balance the federal budget, even promising a surplus by 2024, but only with the sort of sleights of hand that Republicans have so often derided.
I get that budget documents are often as much aspirational as anything else, but surely they should have at least some grounding in reality? Here’s the best part:
The plan contains more than $1 trillion in savings from unspecified cuts to programs like food stamps and welfare. To make matters more complicated, the budget demands the full repeal of the Affordable Care Act, including the tax increases that finance the health care law. But the plan assumes the same level of federal revenue over the next 10 years that the Congressional Budget Office foresees with those tax increases in place — essentially counting $1 trillion of taxes that the same budget swears to forgo.
House Republicans sure don’t make it easy to take them seriously, do they?
Source –
Republicans Take Game Playing to New Heights With Latest Budget
Mother Jones
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The Pentagon is unable to account for more than $500 million in U.S. military aid given to Yemen amid fears that the weaponry, aircraft and equipment is at risk of being seized by Iranian-backed rebels or al-Qaeda, according to U.S. officials.
….“We have to assume it’s completely compromised and gone,” said a legislative aide on Capitol Hill, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
“Arming our allies” works sometimes, but just as often it ends up like this. If we’d done this in Syria two years ago, those arms would most likely be in the hands of ISIS or Iranian militias by now.
There just aren’t very many good middle grounds between staying out of a fight and getting fully engaged in it. Iraq is our latest stab at this middle ground, and so far it’s too early to say how it’s going. But recent history is not kind to the idea.
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If a miracle happened on Friday, an un-miracle happened on Sunday. I was fine all day Friday, fine on Saturday, and fine Sunday. Until lunchtime. Then I collapsed again. Ditto on Monday around 10 am. Ditto again today.
As usual, no idea what’s going on. But I’ll blog whenever I have spurts of energy.
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This isn’t exactly Oprah levels of adulation or anything, but President Obama’s Gallup approval ratings have been rising steadily ever since Republicans won the midterm elections last year. He’s been bouncing around positive territory ever since the start of 2015, and today he clocks in at 48-47 percent approval.
Is this because the economy is picking up and people are just generally happier? Is it because his executive actions have made a favorable impression on the public? Is it because Republican incompetence makes him look good by comparison? Hard to say, but it certainly suggests that Democrats are pretty happy with him. As Ed Kilgore says:
Among Democrats, who are supposedly on the brink of a “struggle for the soul of the party,” and ideologically riven between Elizabeth Warren “populists” and Obama/Clinton “centrists,” Obama’s approval rating stands at 81%. And looking deeper, he’s at 86% among self-identified “liberal Democrats,” 78% among “moderate Democrats,” and yes, 67% among “conservative Democrats,” such as they are….This is another example of isolated data being somewhat limited in value, but worth a couple of dozen Politico columns.
Yep. And I’ll bet that once things get going, Hillary Clinton will poll about the same way.
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Mother Jones
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A couple of weeks ago Pew did a poll about government policies during the recession, but I’ve been too sick to blog about it. However, it’s stayed safely in my Saved Stuff folder awaiting my recovery, so here it is today. It’s really two charts. Here’s the first one:
Nothing too surprising about this. Generally speaking, people think the government did a lot to help out banks (bingo!), large corporations, and the wealthy. The poor and the middle class pretty much got nada. Since any poll like this is going to be dominated by the sheer number of poor and middle class respondents compared to wealthy respondents, this is about what you’d expect.
But now take a look at this table:
That’s amazing. Even those with high incomes agree that wealthy people benefited the most from government policies and that the poor and middle class got bupkis. Even Republicans largely agree that this has been the case.
This is Stockholm Syndrome writ large. Everyone—rich, poor, Republican, Democrat—agrees that in the wake of the greatest financial disaster since the Great Depression, the government mostly turned its largesse on banks, big corporations and the wealthy. Nonetheless, Republicans—the longtime party of banks, big corporations and the wealthy—have done increasingly well over the past six years. For an explanation, take your pick:
Most voters don’t understand Republican economic priorities.
Most voters don’t think Democrats would do any better.
Most voters think this is just the way the world works and there’s no point voting based on economic promises in the first place.
Whatever the reason, only about 20 percent of middle-class voters think government policies benefit the middle class. The first party to figure this out and embrace it wholeheartedly has a huge electoral opportunity ahead of it. But first, they’re going to have to ditch the rich. Can either of them ever do that?
Link:
Chart of the Day: Even the Rich Think the Middle Class Is Getting Screwed
Mother Jones
David Brooks has a bit of an odd column today:
For many years, Democratic efforts to reduce inequality and lift middle-class wages were based on the theory that the key is to improve the skills of workers. Expand early education. Make college cheaper. Invest in worker training. Above all, increase the productivity of workers so they can compete.
But a growing number of populist progressives have been arguing that inequality is not mainly about education levels. They argue that trying to lift wages by improving skills is an “evasion.” It’s “whistling past the graveyard.”
….Focusing on human capital is not whistling past the graveyard. Worker productivity is the main arena. No redistributionist measure will have the same long-term effect as good early-childhood education and better community colleges, or increasing the share of men capable of joining the labor force.
I don’t quite get who Brooks is arguing against here. Larry Summers is the obvious target, but Summers has been clear that he thinks education is important, both individually and for the economy as a whole. He just doesn’t think that improved education is likely to have much impact on growing income inequality, which is driven by other factors.
But Brooks never even pretends to address this. I don’t think there are any prominent Democrats arguing that education isn’t important. Pretty much all of them are on board with good early-childhood education and better community colleges, among other things. That will help individuals and make the American economy stronger.
But will it rein in growing income inequality? As long as inequality is driven primarily by the gains of the top 1 percent—which it is—then it won’t. To address that particular problem, we have to look elsewhere.
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Yes, Education Matters. But It’s Not the Answer to Growing Income Inequality.
Mother Jones
I’m feeling just energetic enough today to actually eat lunch (hooray!) and take a picture of the baby hummingbirds in our backyard. They sit there all day with their beaks stuck in the air waiting for mama to come home and deposit something yummy.
Hummingbirds must be pretty stubborn critters. Last year’s crop of hummingbird eggs never hatched because the nest was on a thin branch that blew away during the first decent storm of the year. So what happened? This year’s nest is in exactly the same spot as it was last year. I guess mama is lucky that we’ve had pretty mild weather this year.
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