Happy Thanksgiving from The A.V. Club
Donald Trump couldn’t give less of a shit about the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, so it’s clear that the country isn’t doing much better than it was during the last couple Thanksgivings, but at least we do have a couple of things to be thankful for. The Democrats took control of the House Of Representatives (which should be good), the cool cats at Onion Inc. decided to unionize (which is good), and Red Dead Redemption 2 finally came out (which is also good), but here at The A.V. Club we’re most thankful for the eternal love and support we receive from you. We don’t even mean that in a broad sense, like we’re thankful for all of our readers and we’re glad that people keep coming to look at and comment on the stuff we say, we literally mean that we’re specifically thankful for you, the person reading this right now.
Now, you’re not going to have much else to read on the site today, since it is Thanksgiving and most of us who normally cover news are taking a turkey-themed break from all of our normal responsibilities, but we did want to introduce a revolutionary new idea that we think could really make your Thanksgiving a lot more fun: This year, skip the turkey and go straight for the beef. In other words, forget being polite and just talk about all of the stuff you’re not supposed to talk about at the dinner table. It’s a cliché to complain about having to deal with racist uncles and homophobic cousins, so we think everyone should invert the cliché by laying it all out on the table and really digging in on any issues you may have with your family/friends/pets/whoever else you may encounter.
You could start by asking everyone to say who they voted for in the mid-terms and why, which should give you a nice baseline for their political leanings. If they voted Republican or didn’t vote at all, start blaming them for every bad thing that has ever happened in the world. If they voted Democrat, come up with something else to argue about (we recommend questioning whether or not there are too many of those Marvel movies these days). In theory, this will lead to some larger understanding between you and the people you eat pie with, but that’s not really the point. We’re more interested in the art of subverting the trope of silently tolerating people until you can start complaining on the ride home (or to Target, or wherever else you go when you’re sick of your friends/family/pets).
While we’re on that subject, you don’t have to go out shopping on Black Friday, but if you do, treat any retail employees you encounter better than your family members. Dismissing politeness is good for the dinner table, but we really need more politeness everywhere else. Also, if you’re really in the mood to buy something, may we interest you in a very cool website called The A.V. Club? We’re not sure how you would go about doing that, but just grab a bag of money and start asking around. Someone will help you.
Anyway, happy Thanksgiving to everybody reading this, happy Thursday to everyone who doesn’t celebrate American Thanksgiving, and happy Turkey Day to the people who think it’s fun to call it Turkey Day (it absolutely is fun and you’re right to do it). We’ll see you tomorrow.