Walking through the aisles of Walmart, you may happen to walk through the clearance section. You find in this particular section bags of assorted candy, leftover costumes, and the Halloween decorations no one wanted. After leaving the land of clearance items, you enter the brightly lit corner of the store with trees higher than a kite, snow covered trinkets, and toys galore. It’s October 29.
For all of my life, I have found Christmas tends to take over Thanksgiving. But I have never understood why Christmas is the winner of the battle of the holidays every single year. Is it commercialism, religion, or just the love for the holiday?
November 1st is when every single Walmart, Target, Kroger, and any other convenience stores starts rolling in anything Christmas to get everyone into the Christmas spirit.
A majority of American citizens also find that the start of the Holiday season is right after Halloween. Christmas music even starts to play and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You” plays every other song. Healthline.com, clinical psychologist Linda Blair calls that phenomenon the gradual Christmas crawl. Another example is when stores play Christmas music earlier and earlier to sell more products. According to Blair, this can have a negative impact on mental health.
Also, people who work or shop in these stores are more likely to realize when it’s November that another year has gone by, one less year or one year without something or someone. It is just a reminder that everything moves fast and will never slow down. This is the dark reality of the most wonderful time of year.
“Christmas music is likely to irritate people if it’s played too loudly and too early,” Blair states. “It might make us feel that we’re trapped. It’s a reminder that we have to buy presents, cater for people, and organize celebrations. Some people will react to that by making impulse purchases, which the retailer likes. Others might just walk out of the shop. It’s a risk.”
So what makes Thanksgiving forgotten? I think it was at first about religion. Whether someone is Christian, Muslim or Jewish, everyone has something to celebrate at the end of the year. It is found that there are over 4200 religions that celebrate a winter holiday in some shape or form. Thanksgiving is a fall holiday you can celebrate. Even though only a few countries besides the US honor Thanksgiving doesn’t make it a useless holiday.
The reason I think Thanksgiving is a forgotten celebration is because of the commercialization of Christmas taking over giving thanks. Companies want to sell their product and the best time to promote is during the holiday season. Companies start right away to get the hype so strong that people will buy their product.
Christmas is a holiday that no one can forget even if they wanted to. Everyone has different opinions, and mine is that you should start celebrating Christmas after Thanksgiving.