My Area Walmart Is Playing "Stars Spangled Banner" on P.A. System

[UTUSN]

(---------O.K., I am aware of the evil Walmartization of the globe AND *do* go there occasionally because of the difference in evil prices.)

Hadn't been there in a couple of months (did I make up points there?), and it was a JOLT to hear the FULL "Stars Spangled Banner" rip-roaring through the P.A. system, as I trundled along down the aisle, hunched over the cart. It was, like, we're supposed to stop and stand at attention or something. Perhaps that would be one way to "get through" to Sam's economics management team, that if all customers STOP and FREEZE at attention, it is VALUABLE SALES TIME being sucked away in a big sucking sound. Otherwise, all of us continued about our materialistic compulsion, as if it were just another Muzac ditty, like "I Can't Get No Satisfaction". But with an uneasy, guilty discomfort.

Leave it to the wingnuts to inject their Phariseeism on everybody else. They must play it every half hour or hour or so. I'm going to call and find out, and whether this is a chain-wide practice.

[wtmusic]

1. Don't allow the RW to co-opt our national symbols

Remember -- the RW does not own the "Star-Spangled Banner". The RW does not own the flag.

Turning the flag upside down, refusing to play the "Banner", refusing to make the Pledge of Allegiance just hands them to the RW on a plate.

I'm gonna sing it loud and proud, and shove the flag in THEIR face.

[freetobegay]

2. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black

eom

[cynic4life]

3. the star spangled banner doesn't mean

anything anymore. the fact that Walmart plays it as they would play "can't get no satisfaction" or anyother song proves this. Patriotism is like a drug to these people..they use it to their own advantage but don't know what it means.

[BlueEyedSon]

4. Walmart is a bad place for many reasons. Shop Costco. n/t

[mouse7]

5. So don't shop there

There really isn't even an excuse for things being cheap at WalMart. Shop on the net. I find far better bargins on the net then I ever used to find at WalMart.

[kcwayne]

6. Shouldn't they be playing the Chinese National Anthemn?

[pnorman]

10. "... Chinese National Anthem?"

That's the funniest thing I've heard today. The day is still young, but I don't think it'll be topped. I'll be sure to use it at an appropriate occasion. THANKS

pnorman

[qb]

7. Maybe it's some kind of subconscious compensation

for their un-American behavior - screwing their employees with low wages & benefits.

[callous taoboy]

8. My conflict:

I have this really rich mom of a student in my class and she has so far given me $60 worth of Mal-Wart gift certificates this year. I
f-ing hate everything that this greedy empire stands for. But, hey, to a teacher $60 can buy lots of class supplies.

[Delano]

11. That would be the exception where I would go there.

Walmart doesn't make any more money off you by your using the certificates - they've already been bought. I'd spend them.

[outinforce]

14. Couldn't You Do This?

First, arrange for some coverage -- a Local TV station of newspaper.

Second, take the certificates to the parking lot just outside your local Wal Mart.

Third, position yourself just outside the door of WallyWorld.

Fourth, having made sure that the media are there with cameras, ignite the certficates from WalMart.

Fifth, make sure you tell your students why you did this.

[Delano]

9. How hypocritical for a company that FORCES suppliers to move overseas

Walmart IS evil, I haven't been there for years, and wouldn't go. It's not just globalization, it's their horrendous union-bashing, discrimination record, etc. They're extremely hypocritical for playing an anthem that they desecrate every day with their anti-American business model.

But then again, I would venture that someone who calls himself a "liberal" and shops at Wal-mart might be a bit hypocritical too. Their prices are NOT that low, either. I'm not rich by any stretch - pretty poor in fact, and I still patronize local mom-n-pops whenever possible, and I will not set foot in a Wal-Mart.

[UTUSN]

13. O.K., I Complained to Arkansas, and Here's the Deal

I called the local store manager and he said it was a "from Arkansas" policy and he gave me the #, 800-wal-mart, 800-925-6278, www.walmartstores.com.

At the phone # there is the menu "3" option for general issues and the "4" option for the CEO, Lee SCOTT. I took the latter.

I spilled my guts, that it wasn't an issue of "patriotism", that mine had better NOT be questioned, that it was a SHOCK to hear it in that context, that if everybody STOPPED while it played Walmartization was losing money, that it was a cheapening, a desecration, that it was INTRUSIVE on everybody's own expressions of their own beliefs, that--what was NEXT, reciting a PRAYER over the P.A. system.

The employee said she hadn't heard of this as a policy, and went to ask. She returned to say that it was NOT a store policy, that it was WALMART TELEVISION playing a commercial for the Olympics, that there had been many complaints, and that this was stopping TODAY. I said, what if thousands of wingnuts NOW call WANTING this. She said it will NOT continue.

And to the other concerns: Yes, I know there are MANY issues about Walmart besides "globalization", and, no, I don't have a Costco.

[Delano]

15. The thing is, I don't have a problem with them playing the song.

I have a problem with Walmart itself, starting with the inception of the company and the very way it's business model was concocted (get huge tax breaks to move into small town, underprice until downtown business district is boarded up, then raise prices and reap profits until town is bled dry, then close down store leaving small town with no downtown business district, no jobs, and no revenue base.) I hate EVERYTHING about Walmart. I couldn't give a flying fig about the song, to be perfectly honest with you.

[catmandu57]

12. They're doing it here too

I make a once a month pilgrimage to the land of cheap plastic crap, and buy goods imported straight from China, I don't want to, if there was an alternative I would happily give it up.
I was assaulted by the star spangled banner as well.

[Delano]

17. So you have a great need for cheap plastic goods from China?

I don't. I hear a lot of people saying they "have no choice". Somehow I doubt that. There are usually other stores around. I do my best to avoid excessive consumerism, and yet I still find my apartment overflowing with junky clutter that I don't know why I bought.

All of us would do well to buy less stuff, anyway. I'd rather pay more to shop at local businesses and buy 30% less junk in a year. That way I have less clutter in the house, and less flab on my ass in the long run.

[Yavonne]

16. You are very right.

It's very odd that they would play the nation anthem so casually. It's not very respectful in the way that you'd expect wally world to be in regards to it.

[UTUSN]

18. Kick for Research n/t