Author Topic: WATCH: Students want to rename ‘Black Friday', until they find out what it means (Read 474 times)

Mr G · « **on:** November 29, 2021, 08:56:03 AM »

Campus Reform | WATCH: Students want to rename ‘Black Friday', until they find out the name has nothing to do with race

With Black Friday right around the corner, Campus Reform reporter Ophelie Jacobson went to the University of Florida to talk with students about the name.

In 2019, a reader-generated column of opinions was published in the Chicago Tribune, which included a section that claimed Black Friday discriminates against or profiles against Black people.

Jacobson asked students at the University of Florida if they would support changing the name of the day to something less offensive. Most students said yes.

“I’m cool with changing it,” one student said.

“I never saw it that way, but I don’t have that lived experience but if enough people think that it should be that way, then I don’t see a problem with it,” another student said.

“Black Friday sounds offensive,” one student said.

Jacobson then told students what the name “Black Friday” actually means.

According to history.com, in the late 1980s retailers began marketing the day after Thanksgiving as “Black Friday” because after an entire year of operating at a loss (“in the red”) stores would supposedly earn a profit (“went into the black”) on the day after Thanksgiving.

Students then admitted that we shouldn’t change the name anymore.

“No,” one student said. “I think nobody should overanalyze it. If it’s not about skin color, then I don’t see that there’s a problem.”

“Knowing what it actually means...I don’t think this is actually something that is offensive,” another student said.

“I wouldn’t change it now that I know the origins of it,” another student told Jacobson.

Watch the full video above to hear what some students had to say about cancel culture as a whole.

Matthew · « **Reply #1 on:** November 29, 2021, 11:37:09 AM »

Cancel culture almost requires a huge mass of people to be painfully ignorant -- like these students were at the beginning.

I can't even watch such videos, it's so cringe-inducing.

Even with our dumbed-down media, it takes HOW LONG to teach you that little tidbit about what Black Friday is? I think I learned it from a newspaper when I was 10 or something. I know the media targets something like a 4th grade level, or assumes that level of education. They don't go too deep on anything. But learning what Black Friday is doesn't require a super high IQ or a lot of ability to think abstractly. Pretty basic stuff -- once you learn it, you remember it forever.

SimpleMan · « **Reply #2 on:** November 29, 2021, 10:23:08 PM »

I had never heard the term before I took a brief detour into retail, this occasioned by an ill-advised relocation in which my wife and I could not find jobs in our fields. I had never been terribly conscious of commercial life, always having had to be frugal out of necessity. I found the term bizarre until a coworker explained it to me, i.e., putting a business's books "in the black".

Working retail in an "entitlement culture" such as the United States is a hard way to make a living, but if you ever want to do a deep dive into human nature, it is an excellent school. When a society gets to the point where miscreants can just walk out of Walmart with stolen goods prominently in display, and the storekeepers aren't allowed to accost them and call the police, that's really sad.

Author Topic: WATCH: Students want to rename ‘Black Friday', until they find out what it means (Read 474 times)

Mr G

WATCH: Students want to rename ‘Black Friday', until they find out what it means

Matthew

Re: WATCH: Students want to rename ‘Black Friday', until they find out what it means

SimpleMan

Re: WATCH: Students want to rename ‘Black Friday', until they find out what it means