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The only word for this prank is pure genius!
Allow me to explain. For those of you who aren't in the know, there is a card game that has become wildly popular with adults of all ages the last few years. The game is called Cards Against Humanity (CAH). It's a multi-player card game that uses simple sounding questions or phrases with blanks in them and ends with hilarity when players use their "answer" cards. For the full history of the game's creation, read this.
I've played this game for several years now and enjoy it immensely. The humor can be as outrageous, racy, or straight up offensive as you want it to be. Humor has always been a great selling point for me personally. But what the company did in response to our now semi-lethal Black Friday tradition, pure genius.
On Black Friday, the CAH site removed all of their products and only offered boxes called Bullshit. This didn't sound like anything out of their normal canon of product names. The company even posted an updated FAQ page explaining that, yes Timmy, they are selling actual bull excrement. For only $6 a box, they sold out of their count of 30,000 boxes within a few hours. They planned this weeks in advance and made sure to use the best level of literal shit, and packaging, to further solidify the joke. And the best part is how well it worked. Of course they received backlash from new customers who weren't in the know about the game and the company's sense of humor. Others were not really surprised, and others were ecstatic! Some of the 2014 Bullshit boxes are already on sale on Ebay for up to $70. Highly unlikely that the resellers will be able to prank people as well as CAH did.
The point to the prank? It wasn't a political statement per say, it was a test to see how far they could push the absurdity that is Black Friday. That people will buy just about anything, even literal shit. I personally don't participate in shopping on Black Friday, at all. I've worked in retail before and I know first hand how terrible it is. Rude customers being obnoxious, and sometimes straight up violent, to other customers and store employees. I mean, we live in a world where this exists. That in itself is sadder than a box of shit.
Even though Black Friday has become an embarrassing display of the collective greed and materialism of the western world, it will only get bigger each year. Some companies refused to open on Thanksgiving to allow employees the chance to enjoy a national holiday with their families. You know, the entire point to the holidays? Until customers refuse to stampede over their fellow citizen for a slightly discounted television or computer they really don't need, nothing will change. I'm just glad CAH found a way to shine a brown-colored light onto Black Friday and still made a profit. The joke is on us, but CAH is laughing with us.
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