Starting at midnight Thursday night through midnight Friday night, we will be joining with people across the country and beyond to demonstrate our collective outrage over the hostile takeover of our government by unelected billionaires and by those who put profits before people. For one day, this Friday, we pledge not to buy anything from any major online or in-person retailers, and we pledge to refrain from using credit cards. We recommend staying away from Facebook, Instagram, and “X.”
This action began as a protest against those corporations who abandoned diversity, equity, and inclusion programs to placate a white supremacist administration. Those corporations include Target, Citi Bank, Google, and Disney. It quickly expanded into a “Buy Nothing Day,” with particular recognition of the role of finance capital. The concept of Economic Blackout 2/28 has quickly spread on social media, propelled by activists, faith communities, students, and rank-and-file workers everywhere. The movement goes beyond our borders. In Canada, consumers will target USA-based companies to protest Trump’s tariffs, and Mexicans will participate in the Latino Freeze Movement to protest US anti-immigrant and anti-DEI policies.
Please participate in this action! It is a simple act that we all can accomplish and that can quickly add up to a collective impact.
In resistance,
National Board, CPUSA
If I had been planning to make a big purchase on Friday, but decided to join the boycott and not make the purchase, that is absolutely doing something. That is money that the retailer will not get from me.
If I usually buy groceries on Fridays, or Friday is the day I drive by the local Target and sometimes stop in, but because of the boycott I actively decide not to, that is absolutely doing something. That is money that those retailers might have come to expect, that they will not get from me.
If enough people make those decisions, the impact will most definitely be felt and reach the top.
Collective action is incredibly powerful. Sometimes collective action means deciding not to do something, together. And that is also incredibly powerful.
I’d love to hear your suggestions on what “real” looks like to you.
Commit to 6 months or they’ll never even notice or care. Based on the most recent POTUS election, roughly 1/3 of the population agrees with you. 1/3 of the population just plain doesn’t give a fuck. The final 1/3 of the population will choose to buy extra on your day of boycott just to say fuck you. Now of the 1/3 of the population that agrees with you, we might say quite generously that 20% will even know about this. Of that 20% you’ll be lucky to get 10% participation. At the end of this one day, it doesn’t mean a damned thing.
I think it’s absolutely horrible what Amazon has done (and Wal-Mart before them), but I still buy some stuff from them for a variety of reasons. Not least of all is the fact that the 1/3 of the population that actually gives a shit all stopped shopping there permanently it wouldn’t even slow them down.
Any/ever “don’t shop on x day” is strictly symbolic and mental masturbation.