What If A Parade Didn't Happen?

Forums: Thanksgiving, Macys Parade, Semi-Cancelled
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This year due to the ongoing Coronavirus/Covid-19 Pandemic, there will be a major change to the annual Thanksgiving Day Parade from Macy's.

No viewers hanging out on the parade route. No participants under the age of 18, which eliminates the dozens of high school marching bands. Then again, most marching bands are probably not getting too much in person practice with schools fairly much having gone remote in student's homes.

But wait, haven't we been repeatedly told young people are safer and less at risk?

Balloons? Those great big character balloons such as Garfield, Snoopy and Waldo? Instead of being guided down the street by several handlers, they'll be tethered safely for the most part to cars. Will SpongeBob be showing his scary trademark grin?

The whole thing is expected to be televised...unless of course all the camera operators are banned as well.

Mind you, the parade was cancelled entirely during the years of U.S.A. involvement in World War Two.

And of course, this calendar year has previously cancelled other parades.

Plus, it's official the annual Greenwich Village Halloween Parade is not happening this year. Kind of odd since the majority of parade participants in that, would be masked!

Seeing as how the Thanksgiving Day Parade was cancelled in 1942, 1943 and 1944, it has been done.

There won't be any people gathering for the watching of balloon inflation either.

Instead of the two and a half mile route, it will be in a much smaller 'staging' area.

www.cnbc.com/2020/09/14/new-york-city-mayor-says-macys-thanksgiving-parade-will-go-on-without-crowd.html

www.cbsnews.com/news/macys-thanksgiving-day-parade-television-only-2020/

This is sort of insane. It's far more depressing in this manner than if it was just preempted entirely.

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Type: Question • Score: 3 • Views: 1,969 • Replies: 40

View best answer, chosen by Sturgis

@Sturgis,

Tucker can explain anything.

0 Replies

@Sturgis,

The fact that it takes a ******* pandemic to cancel an event as stupid and wasteful as this parade — and that it becomes a political football — illustrates just how squalid and petty US culture has become. I hope the Times Square New Year celebration gets cancelled as well.

2 Replies

@hightor,

Quote:

The fact that it takes a ******* pandemic to cancel an event as stupid and wasteful as this parade — and that it becomes a political football — illustrates just how squalid and petty US culture has become. I hope the Times Square New Year celebration gets cancelled as well.

My my so having a many generations tradition of a fun parade is somehow wrong and reflect badly on US culture?

1 Reply

@BillRM,

Sorry if it touched a nerve, but I'm specifically talking about this year and the pandemic. The parade is simply an overgrown spectacle of tastelessness and commercialism. Sure, some people think it's fun — bread and circuses — and and some seem to think it actually has something to do with the Thanksgiving holiday. It doesn't. But making a political issue over not having it for reasons of public health is ridiculous, totally Trumpian. And holding a diminished "substitute" — as if its absence were a matter of existential concern — is simply pathetic.

1 Reply

@hightor,

Sorry but your attack the event as an event during it whole long long history not just in light of the current medical situation and that is ridiculous. Driven by nothing but anti american feelings that you seems to hold at least in my opinion.

True Trump is making it far easier to express such feelings

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@hightor,

Quote:

I hope the Times Square New Year's Eve celebration gets cancelled as well.

Your wish has been granted! Mostly. This year it will be a 'Virtual" celebration . To erase the pleasure which may be warming up your blood and veins, the ball will still be drooping dropping.

Apparently a few activities will occur within a cordoned off space and police officers keeping gawking weirdos out.

There is said to be an App which has been created for the whole thing.

www.nypost.com/2020/09/23/new-years-eve-ball-drop -in-nyc-will-be-virtual-this-year/

For those who must know - and those who don't give a flying fig -
THERE WILL BE A FULL MOON that night. So, stay home and watch a werewolf themed movie.

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@BillRM,

I'm not sure what you are trying to say. I don't think it's anti-American to want people to be safe during a pandemic. It's going to be more difficult to vote this year because they can't find enough people willing to risk their health to man the polling places. I think having fewer places to vote, and Trump stating he wants to pack the court so 9 Justices can decide this election is the real anti-American statement. With our democracy at stake, I can't honestly take the time to give a **** over a parade. We can have a parade next year, but this might be the last time the citizens of the United States get to select the President.

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@glitterbag,

I’m not surprised to hear BillRM sounding like Joe McCarthy, it’s just like him to start throwing meaningless accusations about.

What is anti Americanism anyway? It’s not like there’s an equivalent anywhere else, people don’t get accused of anti Britishism or anti Frenchism, not citizens anyway.

It’s not like people have been plotting with a hostile power or engaging in espionage.

Someone doesn’t like parades and that’s not allowed in America, so much for the land of the free. What’s next, thought police and lynching?

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Heh, I would be just as happy without one. I've never liked parades. Loud traffic creating nightmares, paradise for pickpockets. Even as a child, I thought they were dumb.

1 Reply

@jespah,

Thanks, jespah. And izzythepush. I told Sturgis, in a PM, that it didn't make me all that happy. On NYE I plan to take a balloon, climb the tallest tree I can, and drop it while singing Auld Lang Syne in solidarity with the legions of heart-broken revelers bereft of their apparently sole source of entertainment.

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Thinking back, the only parade I ever truly cared for was in 2002. It was in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania for the Columbus Day happenings.

Highlights included the Democrat and Republican candidates for Governor that November...Ed Rendell, Democrat and Mike Fisher on the Republican ticket. Rendell won.

The parade included unknown folks who tossed candy at spectators (it was wrapped in non-political wrappings).

There were also a few actors from the movie The Pennsylvania Miners including John Ratzenberger. (who had been Cliff Clavin, Mailman on Cheers).

I accidentally leaned too hard against one of them there metal things where you put in coins to get a newspaper. It tipped over and so did I. My coffee was prit much finished so no mess or worries. The kind spectators helped me up and the parade resumed....

...oh, I almost forgot. I snagged an Ed Rendell political sign. They were handing them out for free.

I left town the following Thursday morning.

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@glitterbag,

glitterbag wrote:

g
I'm not sure what you are trying to say. I don't think it's anti-American to want people to be safe during a pandemic. It's going to be more difficult to vote this year because they can't find enough people willing to risk their health to man the polling places. I think having fewer places to vote, and Trump stating he wants to pack the court so 9 Justices can decide this election is the real anti-American statement. With our democracy at stake, I can't honestly take the time to give a **** over a parade. We can have a parade next year, but this might be the last time the citizens of the United States get to select the President.

The attack on the Parade was not limited to this year under this set of medical conditions and that what I was clearly referring to.

2 Replies

@BillRM,

We get it, you’re not exactly complicated.

1 Reply

@izzythepush,

izzythepush wrote:

We get it, you’re not exactly complicated.

So it is better to be complicated?.....LOL

1 Reply

@BillRM,

Beats being dull.

0 Replies

@BillRM,

Quote:

Driven by nothing but anti american feelings that you seems to hold at least in my opinion.

If you think "america" means Hollywood, Madison Avenue, Playboy, Disney, mindless consumption, bloated militarism, tasteless commercialism, brain-dead celebrity worship, environmental destruction, unlimited guns and unbridled greed then yes, I'm anti-american.

1 Reply

@hightor,

hightor wrote:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBEzBLZtnYQ[/youtube]

Quote:
Driven by nothing but anti american feelings that you seems to hold at least in my opinion.

If you think "america" means Hollywood, Madison Avenue, Playboy, Disney, mindless consumption, bloated militarism, tasteless commercialism, brain-dead celebrity worship, environmental destruction, unlimited guns and unbridled greed then yes, I'm anti-american.

How do you like electric power, world wide communication beginning with cables under the sea, computers, penicillin, the green revolution and the stopping of such people as Hitler?

An a millions of other things that would not likely had happen without the US nation and system existing?

For all of our many many faults the rest of mankind should still be kissing our behinds.

Let added to the list not having cities street cover by horse ****, not killing off the whales to be able to poorly light our homes not fulling the air over cities with coal dust so we could keep our homes heated.

2 Replies

@BillRM,

Calm down. My statement was conditional:"if you think america means..." See the "if"? I happen to think that there are good things about the USA as well as the bad things I mentioned.

Quote:

How do you like electric power, world wide communication beginning with cables under the sea, computers, penicillin, the green revolution and the stopping of such people as Hitler?

You're assuming that these innovations wouldn't have happened without the USA but I think that (for a variety of reasons) the USA was simply in a better position to develop those things earlier than countries were in Europe and Asia, which would have developed them in time. And you're leaving out many of the technical innovations that were developed outside the USA. Railroads, steam power, and the whole movement from cottage industries to centralized factories.

Quote:

For all of our many many faults the rest of mankind should still be kissing our behinds.

No, that's very childish idea. I can't believe that you even posted it.

Quote:

Let added to the list not having cities street cover by horse ****, not killing off the whales to be able to poorly light our homes not fulling the air over cities with coal dust so we could keep our homes heated.

Yeah, and the treatment of native americans, the destruction of natural habitats, the extinction of the passenger pigeon and the wanton slaughter of bison, slavery and its cultural aftermath, industrial pollution, slag heaps, the Bible Belt, Fox news, Coca Cola, the income gap, hog waste ponds, mountain top removal, light beer, and Barbie.

0 Replies

@BillRM,

BillRM wrote:

the stopping of such people as Hitler?

Had it not been for Americans like Henry Ford giving all of the motor company’s German profits to the Nazi party then there wouldn’t have been a need for other Americans to join the fight against Hitler two years too late.

1 Reply

What If A Parade Didn't Happen?

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