So we’ve all seen the headlines about what may have been the craziest Black Friday in history:  pepper spray, smash-and-grab, bloody fights with shoplifters.  Now, of course, it would be nice if we could all be civilized and remember that wanting to buy a crate of X-box consoles is not really provocation for physical violence, no matter how good the price. But this is America, and that’s a bit pie in the sky, isn’t it?  So I have a different idea:  instead of trying to fight it, just go with it.

Hear me out:  we’ve already got a really cool spec-ops name for it:  Operation Black Friday.  Stores will coordinate the exact opening times for the front doors, perhaps using those cool head-set thingies to communicate about the anticipated onslaught and their sales associates’ readiness capacity.  They’ll go to radio silence just before midnight, and the store managers will be doing those hand-signal things to the associate managers to direct them on the field.  Shoppers will come prepared for battle, wearing night-vision goggles looted during a previous Black Friday (spoils of war?) and decked out in protective gear.  I’d recommend stopping short of using tasers, as has been suggested, but again–this is America.

We could have training classes leading up to it, covering tactics, hand-to-hand combat, and comparison shopping under siege.  What a great form of exercise, and with self-defense built right in!  We would truly be the most feared nation on earth; imagine attackers plotting against us, spying and doing recon, and then reporting back to their leaders that all Americans over the age of sixteen know how to render an assailant unconscious using only a USB cable and a value pack of men’s underwear.  We’d be the new Sparta!  Those who are left at home would tell the valiant warriors, “Come back with Modern Warfare 3 or on it!”

I think this could be a turning point in our history.  Black Friday is not for the faint of heart.  Navy SEALS are taxed to their limits.  We’ve got untapped potential, here, people.  Let’s not waste it.