Wal-mart Protest

Today I went to a protest against Wal-mart. Wal-mart has many dishonest practices that I am against. I do not shop there. People have told me how they are cheaper then other stores which maybe true for where you live but I have gone into the store with a list of items I purchase most often and they were generally not the cheapest place to purchase the items. This is dependent on where you shop and other stores in the area so it may not be that way for you. A specific name brand or a dvd would be around five cents cheaper but generally the big stores prices were around the same price as Wal-mart since the stores are in competition and a few of them even match prices with other stores (if you bring in the ad they'll match it or beat it). When I looked at store brands instead of name brands though a lot of places were much cheaper than Wal-mart.

I could list many reasons to not shop Wal-mart and tell you of the bad things that Wal-mart does but you likely already know many of them and there are sites already devoted to reasons not to shop there. Ranging from criminal reasons, labor issues, environmental reasons, health care issues, sweat shops, censoring, and more.

Some sites:
Wake Up Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart Watch
Wal-Mart Movie
Against the Wal
The Writing on the Wal

At the protest around 70 people showed up to protest. A private security company told us we could not park anywhere in the area since it is not allowed. We had to be customers to park there so everyone went and purchased something at one of the other stores so that we had a valid reason for parking there.

For some reason four police cars each with two officers showed up and told us that we had to leave. We were not violent and were on public property (cars weren't but we did purchase something giving us the right to park there). Why were so many officers needed?

Even though I went to the protest and am planning on going to other protests in the future (for other things as well). I occasionally wonder if they are pointless. This protest did not make the news, people still went into Wal-mart even though we were standing there, and there seems to be no noticeable effect. I like to think that I am making a difference and Wal-mart will stop its bad (for humanity) practices but so long as they continue to make a profit they have little incentive to do so.