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Pepper-Spray Cop Begets Pepper-Spray Shopper
First we had the Pepper-Spray Cop. Now we have the Pepper-Spray Shopper, an as-yet unidentified woman who allegedly sprayed open an avenue for herself amid crowds grasping for Black Friday bargains in an LA-area Walmart. Apparently, she needed an Xbox at half off.
As the Los Angeles Times described it:
20 customers, including children, were hurt in the 10:10 p.m. incident, officials said. Shoppers complained of minor skin and eye irritation and sore throats….
The woman used the spray in more than one area of the Walmart “to gain preferred access to a variety of locations in the store,” said Los Angeles Fire Capt. James Carson.
“She was competitive shopping,” he said.
Of course, big box stores have long encouraged “competitive shopping.” After an employee was trampled to death at a Long Island Walmart on Black Friday in 2008, stores vowed to improve their crowd control. But they don’t advertise their sales with the words “door busters”—with that hint of drug-raid-level violence—for nothing. They know that hysteria can drive higher sales. It works so well that stores have been moving door busters back earlier and earlier, so that this year Black Friday at Walmarts across the country began on Thanksgiving night, forcing employees to work on the holiday in order to sow the itching powder of urgency among customers.
Friday’s “Day of Spray,” as TPM dubbed it, included not only reports of an off-duty cop pepper-spraying a shopper during a disturbance at a North Carolina Walmart, but a cop tasing someone in an Alabama Walmart, and shootings and robberies outside Walmarts in South Carolina and California. (I won’t pin any of these actions directly on this obnoxious, constantly running Walmart TV commercial, but it does portray a shopper as a babbling, practically drooling idiot.)
But the suspected Pepper Spray Shopper—who turned herself in to police, though her name hasn’t been released—provides the most telling example of our twisted economic times. If she did what she’s accused of, then this woman picked up the same device she’s almost certainly seen police use against Occupy protesters and used it against her fellow citizens; she may be part of the 99 percent, but a competitive edge is a competitive edge.
And that is, of course, what the 1 percent want, a debilitating free-for-all among the masses in the Promised Land of constant competition. Stay divided and be conquered. Sic the middle class on, say, public-employee union members for their health benefits rather than demand that corporations (like the famously anti-union Walmart) provide decent benefits.
Republicans tell you all the time: don’t direct your frustration at the “job creators.” They and their tax breaks must be defended in the name of “freedom,” and sometimes, sure, it takes an increasingly militarized police force to do it. Pop culture doo-dads like HD TVs, Xboxes, the latest i-Product—the tokens of capitalist acceptance—on the other hand, are worth gassing your neighbor over.
This Ayn Rand logic was in fact what set the Tea Party in motion in early 2009. Remember CNBC correspondent Rick Santelli’s rant on the trading floor of the Chicago Board of Traders? He was incensed at a White House proposal that would have helped troubled homeowners restructure their mortgages. “This is America!” he yelled, and, turning to the traders behind him, asked, “How many of you people want to pay for your neighbor’s mortgage that has an extra bathroom and can’t pay their bills? Raise their hand!” To which the traders booed as of one throat. “President Obama,” Santelli shouted, “are you listening?”
Helping your neighbor in a crisis—even if you’d also help yourself by preserving the value of your home—well, that just smacks of socialism. In fact, any sign of public cooperation should be regarded with suspicion. As the UC Berkeley chancellor, Robert Birgeneau, wrote of Occupy demonstrators there two weeks ago, “linking arms and forming a human chain…is not non-violent civil disobedience.” It’s a dangerous hint of collectivism, a Hayek-raising horror that must be stopped before that human chain fetters the 1 percent.
We’ll know for sure that the masses get it when they finally start using private drones for Presidents’ Day sales. Until then, vigilance…
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41 Comments so far
Show All"But the suspected Pepper Spray Shopper—who turned herself in to police"
last night's hype-the-holiday news report said "police were searching for the pepper spray shopper" and i wondered if they're recruiting.
this is a glaring example of how dog eat dog our society has become
that any one would even consider assaulting any one just to get something on sale
Insane levels of violence seem to be endemic in the mad "consumerism" that pervades every aspect of US society. And its legal custodians set a fine example. See Cops bust open face of Black Friday grandpa at
http://rt.com/usa/news/black-friday-newman-police-269/
"Hey Joey, want to play army today?"
Nah that's too boring Timmy. I know lets play cops and protestors!
You're the protestor. Sit down and chant or something. Then I'll pretend my squirt gun is a pepper sprayer and make you drink it. Then I'll hit you with my foam billy club.
That's no fun what do I get to do Joey?!
"Here Timmy you can throw nerf rocks.
"After that we can go hook into the net with our chippies and play Nuclear Gladiator 3000."
Occupy came along just as the company overlords thought they had it all rapped up, another couple of years till the complete brainwashing of a generation of youth.
Occupy is showing a new way
I've wondered for years as the term "Black Friday" took hold to describe the year's most hyped corporate scam as a blessed, eagerly awaited event of joy...a super-shopping experience not to be missed!
At most other times in human history events, groups or individuals associated with the word 'black' were anything but joyful. There was the Black Plague, Black Tuesday (stock market crash of 1927), and Black Monday (crash of 1987). Add Black September, Black July and Black Spring...historically bleak moments.
Then there are the black hats (bad guys) and white hats (good guys), black witches, black cats, black holes. Hateful, mean people are called 'black hearted', Nazi SS solders and Italian fascists were called 'blackshirts'.
While black has symbolically also represented good, power, elegance, style and other positive things...it has more often been associated with the dark, mournful, deadly or merely unpleasant.
The fact that this country's "Black Friday", the busiest shopping day of the year, brings about even one incident of 'shopper madness' which results in injury or death to others is disgracefull. That it is embraced year after year as "THE EVENT" that marks the beginning of the Holiday Season and Christmas shopping...is truly sad testimony to the power of advertising propaganda and the mindlessness of the masses.
And how in the world have retail sales practices resulted in dependence on one day of the year 'making or breaking' a company...putting them 'into the black' by unleashing "Black Friday" on the masses. A very poor business model, if you ask me, that would make necessary an annual predatory day of sucking the anemic blood from their customers. Especially sad when it has been somehow camouflaged by admen/women to seem a positive and necessary part of the whole holiday experience.
Utterly amazing to me how relatively normal decent folks can be transformed into crazed shoppingbots when exposed to mega-sales pitches, scams and media hype.
"And how in the world have retail sales practices resulted in dependence on one day of the year 'making or breaking' a company...putting them 'into the black' by unleashing 'Black Friday' on the masses."
________________________
It's a neat metaphor for the appalling essence of capitalism, though.
"Black Friday", rather like "blood diamonds", is an object lesson demonstrating that under capitalism, one person's "black" is always someone else's "red".
The woman who pepper sprayed was Hispanic.
None of us have to participate in Black Friday. It's a choice and I certainly don't have to wax poetically about the significance of the color. IMO, CD has far too much spontaneously created symbolism from certain commentators. IOW, people do like to talk out of their posteriors. I'm no exception.
Here's something a little lighter: http://www.peopleofwalmart.com/
I laughed my arse off.....
"The woman who pepper sprayed was Hispanic."
Does that make a difference?
You'd have to be the judge of that.
Knowing that Savan is a pro-amnesty shill I'm suspicious of her motivations for writing this article which is not her usual subject matter.
'Republicans tell you all the time: don’t direct your frustration at the “job creators.”'
Competitive shopping is an issue. But the wider issue is understanding when something, e.g. competition, is appropriate and when not. Definitely if a simplistic world were viable, we'd simply choose cooperation over competition. But when we realize our role, everyone's role, in a truly prosperous society (as in health and well-being) is to understand, then we search deeper than the elites want us to. And then we find a fascinating potential that we can build toward, once we slough the elite parasites off our backs. Mainly that task involves working with confidence/trust. When we eliminate our confidence in elites and instead have confidence in ourselves, we find it easy to deflect elitevil propaganda such as that in the quote above. In that evil message, elites are trying to buttress their illegal/immoral monopoly ownership/control over industrial production, over the economy, and thus over the society. And in the process stealing away the people's confidence in themselves. Notice how if they repeat such trash messages enough, the people come to believe it. What could be more wicked than to steal people's confidence in themselves?
Instead of that recipe for disaster, we on the far left advocate a plan for the people's self-determination, through their own personal ownership/control over a piece of production, over the local economy, over public policy, and thus true effective public control over the society. WE are the job creators, through our personal demands in the LOCAL markets, and policy mills.
Knowing when competition is appropriate is like knowing when technology is appropriate. Understanding/enlightenment are for the people. Ownership/control are for the people. We have to take what is ours, ehh? Take it from the elites and watch them starve. The evil side of human nature must be treated as such for the rest of human nature to be free. It is appropriate to deny the predator access to food. Only in a world without predators can the good flourish. We've already established that predators are not crucial to a thriving natural world.
Ownership/control of the economy is ours to take. The economy is ours to build. WE ARE THE JOB CREATORS.
Call the 'elite' what they are, psychopaths. Then you can start ways of dealing with them and putting them in their place. Identifying and defining the real problem is the first step. But watch out for those drones, I wouldn't be surprised if the military is selling 'drone kits' to the elite kids for they exceptional video games.
monkey see...
As usual, I remained fascinated-- or obsessed-- with how the most dumbed-down organ of "manufacturing consent", local teevee news broadcasts, portray given events.
Not surprisingly, since local TV stations are symbiotic partners with local advertisers, the overall Black Friday coverage radiates with good-natured approval.
This resonates with the ubiquitous local teevee claim that it lives to inform, edify, and serve the Common Man; this is established on multiple levels: network affiliate mission statements piously affirming the station's corporate good citizenship and role as a constructive member of the community; attractive and charming local celebrity infotainwhores making public-service and charitable appearances; vacuous slogans emphasizing paternalistic solidarity, e.g. "We're On Your Side"-- and heavy reliance on "man in the street" aka "vox pop" coverage during their earnestly self-important and breathless, sensationalistic broadcasts.
If the Occupy movement doesn't fade away, it's only a matter of time before some local station makes itself the unofficial sponsor for the "99%".
So when it comes to Black Friday, these factors coalesce to produce the above-cited tone of cheerful approval. Oh, things get a little bit rowdy or crazy, but generally the "team coverage" fans out to buttonhole the folks shopping on Thanksgiving, camping out and mobbing up outside stores, or in the act of frantically shopping.
All in all, the message is that Black Friday is both inevitable and benevolent-- a good thing, and a win-win situation for merchants and customers who can take the heat.
However, the newscasters will switch to Incipiently Horrified Rubbernecker mode while reporting "excesses" such as the pepper-spray shopper, in-store mêlées, or the poor guy crushed to death.
Not that they're supposed to editorialize anyway, but they sober up and report the passing horror stories with appropriate lip-bunching or head-shaking that equate to bystanders muttering "Wow!" or "Damn!" at the scene of a spectacular car wreck.
Still, there's the implication that these are unfortunate aberrations or exceptions, and that Black Friday is, like an Extreme Sport, generally arduous and competitive capitalist-society Good Clean Fun.
After all, despite the overabundant hype to the contrary, their mission is not to controversially connect the dots or point viewers toward the deeper, ultimately subversive implications of the madness they truly "cover" so expertly and diligently.
Excellent observation and analysis.
I'd think the incident of the pepper-spraying "competitive shopper" was funny if I thought it could only exist in the realm of the absurd. However, what was yesterdays' "absurd" is now today's "normal." Congratulations, America, for having once again set a new record low.
Perhaps she has learned her behavior from the worst - the corporations.
"Perhaps she has learned her behavior from the worst - the corporations."
Ah, this is the ammo the right uses to discredit any progressive/liberal efforts - the acceptance that one is not personally responsible.
Despite the headwinds of corporate greed, corruption, etc the real challenge is to walk a straight and narrow. You'll need discipline and good navigation skills.
We're going to have our hands full with those who don't. We can avoid the cops and corporate goons; there are more degrees of separation, but they'll be no escaping each other.
A person can still be personally responsible for his/her actions even if those actions are learned. We are just a *little* better than programmed robots. : ) What I was getting at was simply that corporations (run by the 1%) often exhibit even worse behavior (e.g. killing, intimidating, or otherwise bullying people who stand in their way).
"However, what was yesterdays' "absurd" is now today's "normal." Congratulations, America, for having once again set a new record low."
That's from your original post.
I certainly don't accept it as normal, and never will. This woman was willing to kill (if someone would have had a respiratory failure)to get an Xbox, not for food or water. Why does one low-life out in CA set the bar for the rest of America?
Just remember: one person's "low-life" is another person's mother....
Honestly, given what I've seen around the city in which I live (and it's one of the biggest cities in this country), her action is just a minor extension of the kind of behavior that is currently accepted as "normal." I'm not saying that what she did was excusable, at all. This is how an "empire" disintegrates, I suppose. Or, perhaps it's how mankind will "evolve." One person at a time, dude. It might be you pepper-spraying innocent bystanders, next.
"Just remember: one person's "low-life" is another person's mother...."
That's funny. The woman had her two children in tow when she sprayed fellow shoppers.
Yeah, it really sounds like you have that big city "sophistication" goin' on. I'm sure it's a wonderful place to live.
"It might be you pepper-spraying innocent bystanders, next."
Somehow I don't think you'd be defending me as vociferously as you are the pepper-spray mom.
I'm not "defending" anyone, really. Just pointing out that human nature affects all of us. From the sound of the scene, though, it's possible that the woman used pepper-spray in self-defense: http://www.mercurynews.com/california/ci_19426509
So, perhaps more than one person was acting the part of a "low-life," then?
BTW, Logitech is a company that manufactures "goods" made in sweatshops overseas. You may want to reconsider your alias, dude.
OK, sweetie. I'll take it into consideration.
Have a good night....
Please. I prefer to be called "feminits bigot." : ) Good night to you, too.
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This behavior isn't natural or normal. it's normal for animals in a zoo or rats. The woman was just nuts. This is Neanderthalism with a vengeance or a case of missing linkism.
What makes humans any better than animals? Sometimes, I admire animals more than humans - they seem to stick to their own code of ethics better than we do. And, aren't we all rats in a [corporate] cage? Moreover, I am a fan of the Neanderthal - recent studies indicate that they probably weren't the brutes people make them out to be today. So, describing a human as a Neanderthal really isn't much of an insult, you know. In fact, sometimes I wonder whether or not Homo sapiens sapiens lived at the expense of Homo sapiens neanderthalensis.... Perhaps our brutality is what killed them off.
Anyway, I wasn't saying that her (or others' - think about all the stampedes/deaths/other crazy behavior that have occurred at stores during holiday seasons past) behavior was normal, but that it's *becoming* normal. And, like any sane person, I think that's rather sad.
BTW, Wonder Woman is the creation of a man, William Marston. I would think a "feminist bigot" would want to be something other than what a man decides she should be. You may want to reconsider your username, sweetie.......
Moronic bully's will see and do what other moronic bully's do, soon we will all be hip holstered caring pepper spray cowboys and cowgirls. Nice, I like that idea, I will become the fastest pepper spray draw in the south.
Draw partner!!!!!!!
camping and occupying stores at 2 am leads to violence and deaths, not only is it not outlawed, the sales get bigger each year
To cite Henry Wlallace from 1942 "Satan has turned loose upon us the insane." "These stooges are really psychopathic cases." Then add to that "No compromise with Satan is possible."
Franklin D Roosevelt's four freedoms and most espcially "freedom from want" are what we're talking about!
FDR wasn't talking about XBoxes and Plasma TVs.
It's as if the store CEO's want to see just how depraved they can get people to act during the annual holiday frenzy. Stay away from the stores, or risk your lives!
Slinkeys & hoolahoops & marbles & Davey Crocket coon skin caps and now Pepper Spray. It has become just a FAD and it soon will pass. Followed up by....
Don't taze me bro.......
Your comment reminds me of an incident about 20 years ago when a 19-year-old Amerikan male spray-painted several expensive cars in Singapore. He was sentenced to caning. The media made a big event out of it comparing the cleanliness and orderliness of Singapore with the out-of-control chaos of Amerika. Some right-wing politicians began calling for public floggings and one idiot ordered 10,000 canes, thinking he would corner the market and make a fortune off the caning craze.
It's not slinkeys, hoolahoops, marbles and Davey Crocket caps that Pepper Spray should be compared to, they weren't used to injure anyone. And I don't remember mobs injuring anyone to obtain one. They were widely available and reasonably priced. That's the difference between marketing then and now. In the fifties if a retailer or manufacturer want to make a profit, they manufacturered a lot of their product and priced it reasonably.
I don't remember scarcity becoming a factor in marketing until the Cabbage Patch Dolls. It seemed to set the stage for manufactured shortages and unreasonable pricing that is today the norm. But even then injuring someone to obtain one was just a twinkle in the advertiser's mind. How did we reach such a low point that we can justify harming another person in order to obtain an item in a retail store? Supposedly an item that will be wrapped and gifted at Christmas. Talk about a radically extreme religious practice.
This may be a case of "monkey see monkey do" after she saw newsclips of how tortured people were by pepper spray and decided it looked ok to use it to her advantage.
BUT.....I also wouldn't doubt it if they started drafting patsies to do this in public so they could have an excuse to take away the pepper spray from the public -- which is women's main defense against rapists in this city. I don't trust the gov at any level but I wouldn't put it past them. And after they illegalize pepper spray, they'll come for the guns. I'm not a gun supporter at all, but I just think they are are out to de-arm the public so they can really move in on us with fascism.
Let us spray......
It should be an easy acquittal for her. With all those other shoppers in a mad rush, and with knowledge of past Black Friday violence, she certainly has a greater case for self defense than the UC Davis cops.
I was at a shopko in Wis. and had purchases in the cart and took a 25 second bathroom break, when I came out my cart was gone along with my clearance items. A person standing near by was smiling and I am sure he saw the whole thing go down some jerk took my cart and dumped my purchases a few aisles down. I was pissed but not gassed.