By SJ Otto

The official holiday season begins with Black Friday and Thanksgiving. Black Friday officially starts the day after Thanksgiving, which now occurs in more than just Friday usually way before that Friday and then there is that great traditional and religious holiday Thanksgiving.

We could include Halloween as the beginning of the holiday season, but that day is more of a tradition that does not conger up as much money as Black Friday does. Thanksgiving is not a real big money maker, either, but it comes the day before the tradition of Black Friday and that allows for a paired holiday that provides religious tradition as well as consumerism, capitalism, gluttony and an orgy of gift buying and selling. While the average citizen sees the holidays as a chance for families and friends to come together out of love and generosity, which includes gift giving to our relatives and friends, it is also a scam for corporate America to make loads of money. So this article covers both holidays:

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving claims to have its roots in Plymouth Rock in the 17th century. But that event has little to do with the holiday we celebrate today. Native American Indians and white settlers from Europe came together to celebrate a difficult year, where the settlers were helped by the Native Americans, who helped them grow corn and other new world vegetables. There was three days of feasting on native plants and animals, such as fish and deer, corn and pumpkins. There were also games played. It was a real big bash. From that event until the 20^th century, people found various reasons to get together and celebrate a kind of “end of the harvest” celebration.

The holiday we celebrate today was officially established in 1941. A “Thanksgiving” celebration has taken place from various days of the years and inspired by various events, such as the end of the Civil War. This took place of and on throughout

history, until the official holiday was declared, by Congress and the President, in 1941. The traditional fixings and food menu, such as turkey, came from a women’s magazine in the 1850s. Thanksgiving is a holiday dominated by Christianity, even though it is legally a secular holiday. Being Christian isn’t necessary to this celebration, but most Christians see it as a time to “give thanks to God.” While it is a nice day to get together with friends and family, it is ironic that we celebrate an event in which white settlers from Europe came together to feast and party with Native American Indians. For most of our history after that this country fought at least two Indian wars and Native American Indians didn’t enjoy all of the benefits of being American citizens until the early 20th century, when they were finally declared to be US citizens.

For a truly ghoulish look at the Thanksgiving holiday see: “American Thanksgiving: A Pure Glorification of Racist Barbarity” –from Humans are Free.

There are some groups of people who find it barbaric to celebrate a holiday by killing a bird and eating it. Some people are vegetarians and don’t take part in eating a dead bird. Some religions oppose eating and killing dead animals.