Is Thanksgiving Forgotten
Thanksgiving may be widely celebrated but the meaning of the day is often overlooked. Thanksgiving is one of the most celebrated holidays in the United States. There will be more people traveling for Thanksgiving than any other time of the year. While there are millions celebrating the holiday, has it become about things other than thankfulness?
Thanksgiving has become more about feasting and football than it is about being thankful for our blessings. The loss of the meaning behind Thanksgiving is part of the reason that it is widely overlooked.
Here are a few ways that Thanksgiving has become overlooked in our culture.
Calendar Issues
Thanksgiving is sandwiched between two widely celebrated holidays Halloween and Christmas. The Halloween season ends and the Christmas season begins with Thanksgiving largely overlooked. People seem to miss the reality of Thanksgiving because they move from Halloween to Christmas. Thanksgiving seems to have become a day of break to start the Christmas season in earnest. Before Thanksgiving happens, the push for Christmas begins.
Black Friday is the first major shopping day of the Christmas season and occurs the day after Thanksgiving. The focus of Thanksgiving is shifting increasingly to merely the start of the Christmas season. All of these calendar issues assist in pushing aside Thanksgiving Day.
Commercial Issues
The commercial nature of Thanksgiving is increasing but often it centers in a few markets. Millions of people will travel to be with family for the Thanksgiving feast. Thanksgiving spending is centered primarily on food and travel.
Thanksgiving is not a commercial holiday like Halloween and Christmas. There are no purchases of presents or costumes. There is no mass spending on candy or wrapping paper. It makes little sense to get people to go out shopping on a day that they are to be thankful for what they already have. The problem is that there seems to be nothing to sell with the holiday other than food.
The commercial aspect of Thanksgiving focuses on Christmas. The newspaper on Thanksgiving Day is filled with advertisements for the Black Friday sales. Only in the United States are people bombarded with the push to spend money on things they do not need during the day set aside to be grateful.
Thanksgiving is overlooked because of the way it falls on the calendar between Halloween and Christmas. Thanksgiving is overlooked through the celebrations of families with a focus on the food, football and other activities. Thanksgiving is widely an overlooked day due to the commercial nature of Christmas and Halloween. Thanksgiving is an important American tradition that cannot be overlooked. Our nation has been blessed in amazing ways and we have many reasons to be thankful.
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