"Cut-Rate Dignity" - Commentary by Tony Seton

Cut-Rate Dignity

Terrorists struck in Orange City, Florida on Friday. In a religious ritual called the day after Thanksgiving shopping madness, a woman was knocked down and unconscious and then trampled by a horde of fellow shoppers. The first-in-line door mat and her myriad followers were unleashed by a siren at 6:00 ayem when the doors opened at the local Wal-Mart. Said her sister, "She got pushed down, and they walked over her like a herd of elephants."

The shopping pachyderms were in a frenzy, lusting over a $29 DVD loss leader. They would not be stopped. Reported the sister, "I told them, ‘Stop stepping on my sister! She's on the ground!’" Some people tried to help, but most stampeded toward the big deals. Observed the sister, "All they cared about was a stupid DVD player."

Paramedics found the 41-year-old woman lying unconscious on top of one of those stupid DVD players, amidst a churning sea of oblivious bargain-hunters. Doctors said that the woman had had a seizure after being knocked to the floor. Added the sister, making little sense,"Patty doesn't remember anything. She still can't believe it all happened."

Wal-Mart can believe it. They gotta be sitting on the edge of their seats waiting for the call from the lawyers. Bending over backwards to show their warm hearts, officials of the megastore called to ask about the condition of their shopper, apologize, and -- are you sitting down -- offer to put one of the cheap DVD players on hold for her. Be still my disk.

Wal-Mart is going to pay through the nose for this one, even though their liability for what happened might fall into a legal grey area. First of all, they advertised to get the crowd. Second, they did nothing to prevent the price-obsessed trailer trash from causing each other injury. When the story plays out before the (hypothetical) jury, the woman will get a free tarp to repair her roof.

Also in the south, at a Toys-R-Us store in Louisiana, where 500 people had been standing in line an hour before dawn, a fight broke out when someone tried to cut in at the front. Some seethingly outraged women chucked a would-be interloper out on her butt.

Imagine the scene playing out on a Nature program. With the stentorian announcer explaining, "The female of the species will do anything for a bargain, including injuring some of her own feral pack to get what she wants. The degree of violence seems to increase with the amount of the discount."

And that’s SetonnoteS...I’m Tony Seton.