Black Friday

Here is an article you may find interesting....

The throng of Wal-Mart shoppers had been building all night, filling sidewalks and stretching across a vast parking lot at the Green Acres Mall in Valley Stream, N.Y. At 3:30 a.m., the Nassau County police had to be called in for crowd control, and an officer with a bullhorn pleaded for order.

Tension grew as the 5 a.m. opening neared. Someone taped up a crude poster: “Blitz Line Starts Here.”

By 4:55, with no police officers in sight, the crowd of more than 2,000 had become a rabble, and could be held back no longer. Fists banged and shoulders pressed on the sliding-glass double doors, which bowed in with the weight of the assault. Six to 10 workers inside tried to push back, but it was hopeless...

Read the full article here.

And this Black Friday story has definitely caught, horrifically caught, my attention.

How does such a thing happen? Are people simply evil? No doubt preachers across the country will be talking about this incident from their Sunday morning pulpits. The true meaning of Christmas? Well, for some it seems to be trampling people to death to get a bargain price.

Beyond my horror, this story has had my brain ticking all day. What individual and group dynamics created this incident? Here's how I've been breaking it down.

1.) You have a highly motivated, focused person to show up at 3:30 am. This person is investing a lot to get out to the store.

2.) When this person arrives at Walmart he/she is thinking he/she is going to be the early bird that gets the worm. There are expectations (hopes) in play.

3.) However, upon arrival the shopper finds a huge crowd. Expectations are dashed. Frustration grows.

4.) The crowd grows to 2,000. Frustration turns to anxiety. The person in line does a simple calculus: There are only so many products and deals inside. Much fewer than 2,000. It appears that the shopper has gotten up early, driven to the store, and stood in line for nothing. That is, unless, the shopper can get inside first.

Psychologically, we now have a perfect storm. Each person has a sunk cost. And rather than walk away people begin to raise the stakes by jockeying for position. Inch by inch the crowd pushes forwad. It's an irrational escalation of commitment, it's a dollar auction. We have 2,000 people playing a game as adversaries. One person starts jockeying for position. This rattles the people around them. These people fear they will be too slow. So they start pushing forward to gain an inch on a competitor. This jittery behavior soon takes over the entire crowd. Particularly as the clock gets closer to 5:00. The mass of people starts pushing forward, preparing to run. And the more jittery and hostile the crowd the more people become emotional and focused on self-preservation: "When this crowd breaks I'm moving forward. Fast." To get the deal? Probably. But I'm thinking a kind of mass hysteria began to take over as well.

I'm sure social psychologists will analyze this incident in the days and months to come. As I said, preachers will be drawing a great many lessons from this incident, decrying this worst outcome of the commercialization of Christmas. And I don't disagree. But I also keep wondering about what was going on in the crowd. What where the small steps that led to the jittery, panicky escalation? The people in that crowd are just like you and me. So what happened to them in that crowd?