Wal-mart is evil.

I've been listening to the radio alot lately for the Christmas music, and every once in a while I hear a commercial for Wal-mart. After the voice is through expounding on all the wonderful things you can buy and how much money you'll save, the last line of the commercial states, "The more you save, the more Christmas you can give."

What?!! Christmas is about celebrating Christ's birth, which leads into his life and the saving resurrection at Easter. This commercial, though it does promote the spirit of giving, is basically saying that the more money you have, the better your Christmas will be. Now on the one hand I understand that with the money you save you can buy friends and family better gifts than if you had less money so, I don't know, maybe they'll like you more. But whatever happened to "It's the thought that counts." Instead of spending hundreds of dollars getting the easy gift, some bit of plastic that will break in a week or a shiny gadget that whoever it is really, really wants but isn't practical, why not put some genuine thought into it.

Commercials like this are part of what make Christmas a stressful season. People think they have to get everyone they know exactly what they want or it won't be a merry christmas. They end up spending more than they can afford, and for those of us without the funds we get stressed because we get gifts and we can't return in kind.

But hey, it's the thought that counts, right?