Coming back to school after Thanksgiving break is always tough.

If you’re anything like me, you spent the entire week’s reprieve watching sports on television, sitting on the couch and putting off that comparative world literature essay which was due Friday at midnight.

Whether your Thanksgiving included turkey, football or pumpkin pie, I can nearly guarantee it included at least some kind of tradition. Unfortunately, this year a certain tradition was corrupted.

If you haven’t guessed by now, I’m talking about Black Friday. This isn’t an anti-capitalist manifesto or even a critique of consumerism, but rather exposure of corporations such as Target, Wal-Mart and many others that opened its doors for shopping on Thursday night instead of the traditional Friday morning opening times.

In fact, according to Business Insider, Kmart, Big Lots, Ace Hardware and Family Dollar opened between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. If this doesn’t infringe on the idea of a holiday, I don’t know what does.

I understand that this year we have six less shopping days than last year because Thanksgiving came so late, and that the earlier Black Friday start can even be beneficial for workers who depend on those extra hours for necessary income.

In my opinion, holidays used to be about rest, and rest for everyone who wanted it. Even if someone didn’t have family to spend the day with, it would be a day when the world would seem to halt and everyone, if they were so inclined, could take a breath and be free from the obligations of work.

I’ve only been alive for 20 (short) years, but the sentiment surrounding Black Friday seems to be becoming increasingly more frenetic as time goes on.

Last year, stores opened very early in the morning, perhaps even midnight, but I couldn’t find a single store that was open on Thanksgiving day itself, which makes this year’s times even more ridiculous. Can you even call it “Black Friday” if the stores opened at 8 p.m. on Thursday?

Even in my small hometown just west of Champaign where I spent Thanksgiving, the local grocery story was open for full regular hours this year for the first time ever. 

While this was convenient for when I needed to go grab some extra grape tomatoes for my dad’s cooking, the fact of the matter is that our little town used to completely shut down on holidays, and there was something quaint and charming about that notion. It seems, however, that the chaotic pull of consumption, even in a small town, has overrun the idea of the holiday.

This is only a very small taste of the Black Friday madness. The fact that thousands of employees across the country had to be ready to work at 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving night is quite shameful. 

A day that is typically free from labor but has become a full night of working.

Thanksgiving is just what its name implies: A time to give thanks. The sad irony, however, is that Thanksgiving is being invaded by a day that is unfortunately associated with gluttony and greed. 

It’s bizarre to think that all over the country last week, people had to skip their dinners or cut their restful time with their families short to work at a store that was opening on Thanksgiving evening. Even sadder, however, is the fact that thousands of Americans flocked to these shops, essentially telling these companies that they will have their consumer support, even if it is at the cost of a holiday.

I’ve been Black Friday shopping before; part of the fun is getting up at four or five in the morning, shaking off the sleepiness of the turkey-filled previous day, downing an extreme amount of coffee and watching the sun rise over the canyons of big-box stores. OK, perhaps I romanticized that a little too much, but you get the point.

What I’m trying to say here is that the deals and sales can wait until Friday. By pushing it up to Thursday, companies actively choose to disrupt one of the most restful times for both consumers and employees, and in turn, chips away at one of the few bastions of true rest that exist in the hectic world in which we live. 

I don’t say this much, but what’s so wrong with keeping things the way they were?

Boswell is a junior in LAS. He can be reached at [email protected].