Today I returned some Christmas gifts to Wal-Mart. I am hopeful that that was my last trip to Wal-Mart ever as I resolved to boycott the store in the New Year. If I am successful at surviving without Wal-Mart in 2007 I may never return to the store if I can help it.

My reasons for boycotting Wal-Mart are numerous, but the vast majority of them have been identified by bloggers and news outlets world wide already. We all know that Wal-Mart is destroying the American economy and eroding society.

1. When Wal-Mart enters a community, small businesses close because they are unable to compete with Wal-Mart’s pricing schemes even if they are providing higher quality goods that are not imported from China. Displaced employees of the businesses that close are forced to take lower paying jobs at Wal-Mart and many of them are unable to afford Wal-Mart’s benefits package even if they are offered benefits.
2. Certain Wal-Marts seem to pay male and female employees on different pay scales. There are a few current law suits going on about this matter and even though it’s still up in the air, I’ve heard it with my own ears from enough Wal-Mart employees to believe it.
3. Wal-Mart hires employees (either directly or through outside agencies) that have questionable immigration status.
4. When I enter a Wal-Mart, 90% of the time I am unable to find an associate that can assist me with my questions or who can direct me to the goods I am looking for. When I lived in Orlando, FL for almost 5 years, the Wal-Mart closest to my home employed an almost entirely spanish speaking staff. Unfortunately, less than 10% of them spoke English, therefore getting assistance was virtually impossible.
5. The goods are of inferior quality and will need replacing several times compared to similar items purchased at other stores.
6. The vast majority of the goods are imported from China.
7. The prices on the self are regularly inaccurate.
8. Wal-Mart does not check the integrity of goods that are returned before they re-shelf them for sale again.
9. Wal-Mart embraces censorship.
10. The smock and smiley face are just degrading and insulting. When is the last time you saw a Wal-Mart employee smile?

Americans used to fight for quality products. People used to read Consumer Reports before they made a purchase or they listened to product news to make informed decisions about what they were planning to buy. When I was growing up, my parents used to spend a lot of money on one or two pairs of sneakers or shoes for me to wear to school. Now mothers would rather take their kids to Wal-Mart and buy several pairs of shoes of an inferior quality (replacing the cheap ones when they wear out) than buy one pair of quality shoes with a good guarantee that could last several months to a year.

I understand that people would oppose my stance because Wal-Mart allows people who have very little money to afford to live a more comfortable life. Some of the poorest people in the poorest areas of America (dirt roads, no electricity, no sewer systems, no running water) are the people who would benefit the most from companies like Wal-Mart. Do you ever see a Wal-Mart planned in or near to these areas? No because they would not make enough money in these communities to warrant the cost of opening a facility.

I am not boycotting Wal-Mart with the intention of starting some big local movement to block Wal-Mart from the Raleigh area. I am not doing this in league with any of the big existing organizations that are taking steps to fight Wal-Mart. I am doing this on my own of my own volition. I am doing this simply because I feel that there are no positive effects of the growth of Wal-Mart. I don’t feel that the few cents that I could possibly save there makes up for having to purchase replacement items constantly and
helping to sustain the trade imbalance the U.S. has with China. I hope that other people who read my blog would be compelled to do the same.

As blogging becomes more prominent in online culture, it is having an incredible impact on society in general. Everyone can be a journalist and report on events as they happen without waiting for the “media” to arrive. Average citizens can help expose corruption in big business, the media, and in our country’s political structure. All of these are great things. This new power is unfortunately coming back to haunt some bloggers.

Over the past few years, several bloggers have been fired from companies both big and small. The claims range from divulging corporate secrets on the web to taking inappropriate pictures in company issued uniforms. Several of the bloggers who were dismissed have taken their former employers to court to battle it out. I think that some of them have a chance of winning, especially if their company has no written policy on blogging or no written policy that could be applied to blogging. The vast majority, however, don’t have any chance of winning at all as this current political administration has allowed big business to run amok and do whatever it wants. There are virtually no protections for the employee and companies can fire you at will without giving you a reason.

All of this has prompted me to start researching these situations to avoid them moving forward with my blog. I am also trying to find more information on how blogs have negatively impacted an individual’s candidacy for employment. Obviously the easiest way to protect yourself would be to avoid mentioning your employer, your job duties, or your coworkers. If you are a whistle-blower, you should always inform the proper agencies and authority at your workplace before attempting to blog about it. If you find it
necessary to get specific about your job or your employer it may be necessary to do everything anonymously to protect your privacy. The EFF has posted an article about blogging safely about your workplace along with a legal guide for bloggers which I am in the process of thoroughly reading.

So far I have tried my best to separate the workplace from my blog. I am curious about how potential employers have viewed my blog and whether or not it has kept me from getting hired. I know that in the case of web development positions or technical and creative writing positions it has almost always worked in my favor. I have heard from other bloggers that they have been passed over for specific positions because of their blog or even because of specific posts on their blog. I hope that I have not been the victim of that kind of prejudice.

Have any of you been rejected from a position due to the content of your blog? If so I’d love to hear about your experience.

Recently I’ve read a lot of articles about MySpace. The vast majority have been negative, although a few bloggers have pointed out some positive aspects of MySpace and how it is effecting how we communicate. I have recently reconnected with some friends that I met as early as first grade which is definitely something I am grateful for. To find these people, however, I had to fight through hundreds of profiles that only the blind could appreciate. I’ve had to install plug-ins for Firefox that cripple music that plays automatically when you load a profile, and avoid pages with auto-playing video clips. At one point in time I found a MySpace profile that actually got my browser to lock up on a regular basis. Putting the gross design flaws and ghastly aesthetics aside, MySpace seems to be a meeting place for people who are unable to write in complete words or sentences so it’s not the place to go for philosophical debate.

I can forgive some of the shortcomings of MySpace and some of the negative trends in online communication that it seems to have inspired. The thing that seems to bother me the most is how it’s degraded the meaning of the word friendship. I think that this problem started back when Friendster was the new hotness. After about a week it became a popularity contest and everyone tried to add everyone else to their little friend list. I thought it got ridiculous when people had hundreds of friends but only knew a handful of them. Now the same disease seems to have infected MySpace. I personally know all of my MySpace friends with the exception of one celebrity. Celebrities and Bands are the exception to the rule because the more friends they have the more fans they can directly touch. In fact I’m considering requesting to be added to more Celebrity and Band friend lists just for the bulletins and updates. The reverse of that is I’m sure that those public figures get bombarded with bulletins from all of their fans.

Since I joined MySpace I have had over 20 friend requests from people I have never met or spoken to with no attempt to start a conversation beforehand. When I reject these requests from complete strangers, I find it amusing that some of them take offense. There’s not much difference between sending out Spam and begging random MySpace users to be their friend. I’d love to ask some of these people who have hundreds of MySpace friends how many of them they actually know. By “know” I don’t mean one or two emails or a couple of IM conversations. I’d also love to hear how these people define the word friendship — I’m sure it’d be worth a laugh.

Next year I am going to try my best to do the following:

1. Boycott Wal-Mart: I don’t think enough people are thinking about the overwhelming negative impact that Wal-Mart is having on our country’s economic structure. Furthermore Wal-Mart goes into communities, destroys small and mid-sized businesses, and forces displaced workers from failed companies to take lower paying Wal-Mart jobs with no medical insurance. Peachy!
2. Quit Drinking Soda: I will not consume soda (diet or regular) with the exceptions of Tonic Water, Club Soda, and Seltzer.

Do you have any interesting New Year’s Resolutions?

This is yet another post about my pathetic posting frequency as of late. I have been busy here in Raleigh for a while and I’m still trying to get all of my proverbial ducks in a row. The holiday season also brought a visit from the parents and the cats who are all doing well.

Raleigh is a really cool town. The people are really friendly and will approach you and strike up a conversation. Having grown up in Queens and lived in Florida, I am not used to this. It’s peculiar to me but it’s also one of the things that makes me feel comfortable here. When I moved to Pennsylvania it took me months to find decent people to hang out with. Aside from neighbors and friends of my family I never really found anyone to hang out with when I was in Florida. Being in a place where people reach out to you is a blessing.

This area of North Carolina is also really socially aware and is populated with many well-educated people. There is a great deal of political activism and people donate a great deal to charities. I haven’t seen this much political and social awareness since I left NYC. We all know how politically aware Floridians are by now, and the school systems there are some of the worst in the United States, therefore you can draw your own conclusions about awareness there. Pennsylvanians are more politically aware and there are some small pockets of activists throughout the state that do good things. There are even several communities in Pennsylvania that are fighting the invasion of Wal-Mart tooth and nail. I wish they would fight racism with such vigor. I’d have to say that the people in this area are more well-rounded than the denizens of my previous areas of residence with the exception of NYC.

Of course I have a lot more to say about Raleigh and its surrounding areas, but I need the time to put it all into coherent sentences.

I’ve been delinquent in wishing everyone a happy holiday so I figure now is as good a time as any to say Happy Holidays. Enjoy your New Year’s celebrations and remember to drink and act responsibly!