Of all the fake Holidays on the calendar, there’s none worse than Boxing Day. Similar to Black Friday, Boxing Day is an event designed to bring out the blackest depths of the human soul through crass consumerism. Yet, are it’s core, Black Friday is about giving, as often people are driven to buy presents for others whilst trampling Wal-Mart employees to death in a ritualistic tribal frenzy. Boxing Day is all about selfishness, as people are blankly purchasing goods for themselves. All that imitation good-will towards others evaporates at midnight on Christmas. No one gives to charity on Boxing Day. People could easily give their unwanted gifts to a donation box, but instead they return them to stores for credit, merely to buy other crap they don’t really want.
The line-ups are always insane. Living two blocks from the mall, I dared entering Best Buy. There was about an hour long wait I’m guessing by the line, and on what? I flipped through the flier they were handing out. There was nothing that exciting. Nothing they couldn’t have purchased any other time of the year for about 10% more. I couldn’t even see if they had what I wanted in stock, because the line extended around the entire game section. I gave up instantly. Why? On some level I realized I was acting just like a glutton. I was seeing that extra slice of cake and chose to say, “No, I don’t need that.” At least not that badly.
To me, gift cards are the culprit. Of all that money rolling into retailers at this time, how much of it is money they already have? 20%-40%? Of course, they’re still making cheddar of these gift cards, due to the amounts these gift cards are valued at. No one is going to find anything for exactly $20. It’s $29.99 plus tax. Honestly, the gift card is like saying, “Fuck you,” to the person you’re buying it for. “Here’s part of a gift, no refunds.” There’s people who sit on gift cards all year. Some even expire. How fucked up is that? You, as a customer, give money to a retailer, in exchange for credit at that store in the form of a gift card. Say the person you buying the gift card for never uses it or else it expires. The company then keeps that money. In short: they robbed you. You gave them money, and they gave back nothing. It’s like insurance, or gambling.
The gift card has somehow become more popular than cold, hard cash. Cash is always in style, and you can spend it anywhere. The gift card? Not so much. Also, let’s say you spend $19.99 out of $20.00 gift card. If you used a twenty dollar bill, you’d be getting a much used penny back. Not so with the gift card. That penny is their’s, unless you want to spend an extra $0.01, plus the money out of your pocket. Then you’ll get some change back.
Most gift cards are used on Boxing Day, but for those wishing to make their purchases later, they’ll often encounter the “trainee.” The new employee who has no fucking idea how to ring through a gift card. You have to stand there and smile impatiently as you wait for their dumb-fuck supervisor to come and do their job for them. It’s like you gave them a ticket to waste your time.
Let’s not forget those who use their cards to discover there’s not one thin red cent on them. You’re assured there’s a good quantity of credit on the card, but you can’t fucking tell. It’s not like you can crack the card open to find out. There you’ll be, handing over your card, and you’re informed there’s nothing on it. Who do you blame? Yourself, the cashier who just rang the card through, the original cashier who filled the card, or the person who bought it? There’s a long list of people who could be fucking you over. Maybe the person who gave it to you is just an asshole. “What, there should be $100 on there!” they could say. For all you know, they could have just picked it up off the shelf and put it in their pocket. People steal gift cards all the time. It’s the perfect crime. What are you going to be charged for if you’re caught? A gift card is really just air in plastic form. You stole $0.00. It’s like you stole the idea of the card without the copyright infringement.
I work retail, and there’s always crackheads wandering around the store trying to sell stolen cards for cash. They’ll assure their mark that there’s $100 or more on the card, and all they want is $50. $50? Why that’s just enough to buy some crack! Of course, there’s nothing on the card. Or is there? I doubt this scam has ever worked, so no one’s really ever been able to check the validity.
What happens to these cards when they’re spent anyway? They’re never recycled, no matter what bullshit they’re feeding you. They’re like AOL discs, only they’re still being distributed. The card is really just a numerical sequence being run through a computer, so what’s the point of the card in the first place? The entire process could be completely virtual. That would solve a lot of problem, but it’s harder to con consumers into buying $50 in make-believe money without a plastic card to wave in their face.
Have you ever been to Best Buy or Wal Mart where they have all those pre-paid cards for phone calls, internet gaming, etc.? How many of those cards are there? How many are physically purchased? Those are the real mind-fuck cards, because you’re spending actual money for fake money on a card to be used for something that isn’t really quantifiable a goods or services. You’re buying a fake currency with real money so someone can buy a few in-game items for their virtual characters in a Second-Life rip-off.
Back to the larger subject of Boxing Day, why are we always fooled by these sales? We know they’ll extend for the full week, if not longer. Stores need to get rid of their inventory, or they’re fucked. They’ll sell the shit until it’s gone. As for the special items listed in the flier. They’re not in store. The company had no intention of giving those items over to you, to the consumer. They were never going to ship them to stores. How do I know? Because I've worked retail. My job use to be order merchandise for the fliers and have it ready for the day of the sale. So I’d send in my orders, and in return I’d receive nothing. They just plain shit didn’t feel like sending it. Other times, merchandise would be distributed automatically, only it wasn’t. The result? On average, 20% of the flier would be missing. Yes, 1/5 items would not be on shelves. Another 1/5 would be in dangerously short supply. Why dangerous? Because someone has to explain to customers why the items in the flier weren’t on shelves? The answer: the store itself is not responsible for distributing the fliers and the fliers themselves are printed months in advance. A lot can change during that time. Or to put it another way: *shrug*. You want it? I ordered it. I called my district supervisor regarding my order, and it’s still not here. Don’t like that? Fuck you. Or go talk to the manager, and then fuck yourself, because there’s no rain checks and the manager will repeat what I just told you, only he’ll phrase it so it’s my fault.
You didn’t need it to begin with. You’re just another zombie under a corporate consumerism culture spell. You’re like the man who shot the last buffalo. You didn’t need it, and there are no more, so congratulations fuckwad.
No one has ever noticed how the TVs on sale during Boxing Day are of the lowest quality offered. You’re not dealing with Phillips or Sony, you’re dealing with Citizen. What’s a Citizen? Exactly, that’s why it’s so cheap. Go invite your friends over to see your shitty TV that’s slightly bigger and flatter than the last one, JUST LIKE YOUR WIFE!
Drivers are the worse around Boxing Day. The weather’s as nice as it could be for this time of year, and I still saw a car wreck at 8:00 while dropping of my fiancée at work. In parking lots, people refuse to follow logical patterns. I’m at a stop sign, waiting to pull out. There’s a car driving by the crossroad with the right away. I wait for him to pass, only he stops. He waits for me to pull out. Only, I can’t because there’s still traffic in the other direction. He thinks he’s helping, whereas he’s making my job more difficult. People try to turn through intersections and stop short because they can’t pull out the whole way. I could have walked, but I’m a lazy, lazy man with regrets.
For all I’ve talked about, I’m still grateful for gift cards. I was all set to spend mine at EB games, but any plans of getting in and getting out (like my sex life) are dashed to hell. I don’t want to stand in line with greasy teenagers for forty minutes when I can’t even get in to see if they have what I want. The line is to GETINTO THE STORE. Imagine spending that amount of time, usually reserved for Disneyland, and then not finding what you want. You’re automatically compelled to buy something you don’t want to try and make up for it. Then you’re out of money, so when you do find what you want, you can’t get it.
Mostly, I’m just pissed off because I didn’t get any games this year, and there’s some good ones I need. To me, Boxing Day is about spending time with my game systems, and I can’t do that. I even check Xbox Live Marketplace’s deal of the day. “The Fugitive.” You can rent it online. Or, you could go to the store and rent it. Or you could buy it for the same price they’re offering on their “slashed” sale price, and have it to own. Xbox Live movie rental expire after about 24 or 48 hours after you first press play. I rented one movie once this way just to see a movie in HD before I figured out TVersity on my computer.
Ugh… anyway, Christmas is over, and that’s the important thing. Every year, Christmas loses more meaning. All the TV specials you watch give you a mixed message that tries to re-establish that link, so you’ll go out and buy things during the commercial break. This year, while watching one of an infinite array of “Christmas Carol” knock-offs, I realized the real message that film portrays, which is If you don’t go along with Christmas, you’re fucking dead. It’s pretty clear about this too. I mean there’s a ghost showing Scrooge his own grave because he wasn’t “Christmassy” enough. He’s only allowed to live because he buys people a bunch of presents. Even then, his survival isn’t guaranteed.
“A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens the most Socialist/Capitalist thing ever written. On one level, it’s saying the rich are economically responsible for the poor, on the other, it’s saying all of life’s woes can be solved with spending more money. It’s like Obama’s America! There’s an underlying sense that if you don’t buy people presents, some form of Proletariat mob will rise up and rip you limb from limb. The redistribution of wealth is critical to human social well-being, and more importantly your own. So watch the fuck out because Santa/Big Brother is watching you.
