Black Friday

[aggienaut]

The following are known as "Black Friday":
1887, Nov 11 - AKA The Haymarket Affair - Four anarchists hung without evidence n Chicago for the recent deaths of police officers.
1919, Jan 31 - AKA The Battle of George Square - Riot in Glasgow
1939, Jan 13 - Fires devastate Australia
1944, Oct 13 - Canadian unit "the Black Watch" devastated in battle
1945, Feb 09 - Allied forces lose badly in an air battle over Norway
1978, Sep 08 - Massacre of protesters in Iran
2004, Aug 13 - Crackdown on peaceful protestors in the Maldives.
Ongoing, Last Fri in Nov - Day of the heaviest shopping of the year in the United States.

   Which of the above is ridiculously unlike the others?

---

Part II
Office Manager Girl: "What're you looking at? Maldives? I thought Black Friday was about shopping?"
Me: "Well no, see this list? These are all major massacres or events which are known as 'Black Friday'. I'm making a little lunch break blog post about how ridiculous it is to equate shopping with massacres of protestors!"
Office Manager Girl: "[thinks for a moment] yeah, I try to avoid shopping on Black Friday. But I really needed to go to Mervyns... [proceeds to talk for ten minutes about her shopping travails]"
   Something tells me she didn't get my point.

---

Additional Note

Comments

[extoria.livejournal.com]

Also, one time I had really bad sex on a Friday, so I called it Black Friday. It's no massacre, but still...

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Hahaha I think that totally counts

[genesayssitdown.livejournal.com]

black friday (shopping) is the most sinister day of them all

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

hehehe

[wagrobanite.livejournal.com]

1887, Nov 11 - AKA The Haymarket Affair - Four anarchists hung without evidence n Chicago for the recent deaths of police officers.
You should go read Dr.James W. Loewen's book "Lies Across America" He has an entry or two about this, it's really funny :)

[birgitriddle]

Apparently every day of the week has been called Black "insert day of the week" at some point or another. Others have financial crashes listed as Black "insert day of the week", so maybe it truly does not refer to what most people think and really the retailers named it so because they are afraid that one day the consumers would not come and they would die a horrible retail death.

Or I just think too much.

Black / Bloody

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Yeah I was thinking (tangent that didn't make it into the entry), I had actually managed to be oblivious to Black Friday the shopping day until about three years ago, probably due to only having brothers. Previous to that I would have thought it had something to do with Northern Ireland. But nothing Northern Ireland related is on the list. So I tried Black Thursday and Black Wednesday. Finally I figured it out, I was thinking of BLOODY Friday. Duh. (= It follows Bloody Sunday.

Re: Black / Bloody

[birgitriddle]

I get Black Monday and Black Tuesday confused since Black Monday was some financial crisis in the 1980's and Black Tuesday was the Stock Market crash of 1929.

Re: Black / Bloody

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

In College there was a particular house where there were a lot of parties. In order to remember the address my friend called it "The Stock Market Crash / Invasion of Poland House" (2938). I thought it was the nerdiest way to remember an address ever ... but I never forgot the address!

Re: Black / Bloody

[birgitriddle]

I approve of this method.

You can tell I'm a history major.

Additional Note

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Three of the seven I listed are ALSO "Friday the Thirteenth" (whereas the odds of that should be 7/30, not 3/7). I coincidence, I think not!


...okay actually I do think its a coincidence.

[nocturneprime.livejournal.com]

Who came up with such a ridiculous phrase anyway? It's as silly as.....people standing outside in the cold for hours after Thanksgiving waiting for a retail store to open.

[tigrkittn.livejournal.com]

It's the day that retailers' account are supposed to go into "the black" (as opposed to the rest of the year that we're running in the red waiting for xmas!) And actually, the day after Christmas is the busiest shopping day of the year.

In the Black

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Ah well thats a much less melodramatic explanation. But I still think the name "Black Friday" is silly to apply to shopping in light of the more serious things it means, and I think most Americans aren't aware of the "in the black" explanation and refer to "Black Friday" as if its Serious Business d=

Re: In the Black

[tigrkittn.livejournal.com]

Oh, I agree it's silly- I just can't help explaining it when the subject comes up, because I'm a dork that way (and probably in other ways too!)

[memeworrywort.livejournal.com]

One death reported for this black friday.

[tigrkittn.livejournal.com]

The one here in Raleigh? Or do you mean "one" where you are?

[memeworrywort.livejournal.com]

It happened in Long Island, New York.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Now see. Now I don't know if one death counts, but say one year there were like three or five or something in shopping crazed stampedes. Now THAT would warrant referring to that particular specific Friday as a Black Friday ... but now that the term is already used for the day under mundane conditions, they'd just have to call it EXTRA Black Friday.

[memeworrywort.livejournal.com]

They're saying the kid was a hero for jumping in front of a pregnant woman who was about to be trampled. That's just what I heard, could be some made up story. Who knows?

[solipglossed.livejournal.com]

I went to the eye docs on Friday. My eye doctors is in an outdoor mall area and I had to buy my friend a birthday gift on Friday as well. Well, being blinded (dilated) I couldn't even freaking see with sunglasses on, or read prices so I managed to grab an item, make my way to a packed register and out in about 20 minutes and GET OUT OF THERE. It was crazy. :(

[unoriginalmoron.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't it be the first Friday after the fourth Thursday in November and not necessarily the last Friday?

[furzicle.livejournal.com]

I had always thought that Black Friday referred to a horrible day in the history of the stock market. I don't remember ever before hearing about it as a shopping day.

I'm sure if I went out on that day to the mall it would certainly feel like a black day for me.

On a completely unrelated note...

[y0ur-c0nscience.livejournal.com]

I just took a poo.

Re: On a completely unrelated note...

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Has it ushered in a black monday in the bathroom?

Re: On a completely unrelated note...

[y0ur-c0nscience.livejournal.com]

Yes, there was, in fact, a massacre of gummy bears occured just prior to my expulsion. It was as if a million voices cried out and were suddenly silenced. The Khmer Rouge has nothing on me.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Office manager girl in the above entry is of course Amy btw. (=

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Nah. I probably shouldn't have mentioned her in the entry, usually I make sure anything about anyone from work is friends-locked just on the off chance that they stumble here. Oh well.

[emosnail.livejournal.com]

Haha yeah I remember the discussion from the BBQ