A Day to Give Thanks…and Shop?

I know I’m not the only one who thinks our culture’s Thanksgiving traditions have grown increasingly depressing.

For many families, this is Thanksgiving Day in a nutshell:

1. Cook a delicious meal. Take a photo of it. Better yet, make it a selfie. Post it to Instagram, so friends who are bored with their own family gatherings can kill time browsing photos of yours.

2. Stuff yourself with a week’s worth of food in one sitting before falling into a dreamless, turkey-induced coma.

3. Awake from the coma, wipe the drool away and (maybe) watch some football.

4. Pile into the car and head for the nearest big box store. Better yet, split up the family into several vehicles in order to divide and conquer.

5. Bask in the festive glow of fluorescent mall lights as you spend the evening buying up discounted stuff you probably don’t need. You may walk off about three tablespoons of mashed potatoes, but you can let your credit card get the real exercise.

Thanksgiving has lost its heart. It’s not about giving thanks. It’s about getting more. And it all sounds pretty empty to me.

I enjoy shopping. And I love a good deal. But not at the expense of destroying a holiday that has so much potential to be fun and beautiful and different than every other day of the year.

Supply and Demand

Is it really that difficult to set aside one day to rest, give thanks to God and hang out at home with family? It sure seems like it, judging from the large number of stores hocking deals on Thanksgiving—and the increasingly early times their doors are opening.

But rather than draw attention to the stores that have effectively canceled Thanksgiving for their employees, I’d like to focus on us, the consumers. I think we’ve decided to collectively ignore the fact that stores will only open on Thanksgiving (or Christmas or Easter or Sundays or any other time) if there is demand.

A Statement About What We Value

By cutting family time short and choosing to spend Thanksgiving spending money, we’re making a statement about what we value. And the retailers hear it, loud and clear.

For those of us working to pay off consumer debt, save for the future, give to the cause of Christ and generally show our non-believing friends and family what makes Christians different, turning Thanksgiving into Black Thursday is particularly dangerous.

Choosing a Different Way

For those reasons and more, my family and I are choosing not to be part of the Thanksgiving Day shopping crowds this year. The demand will likely still be there, but we won’t be part of it. We’re going to stay home, cook together, thank God for the mind-blowing list of blessings in our lives and enjoy a restful, leisurely afternoon.

Because it just doesn’t seem right to celebrate a day of giving thanks by embarking on a frantic, consumer-driven mission to buy up more stuff.

We’ll probably still eat a little too much food. And we’ll be just as likely as the next family to fall into a turkey-induced coma for a few minutes.

The important thing is we’ll all be together.

And we can always get our blood pumping again with an afternoon walk—around the park… not the mall.