A quick question to the Americans of this site...

[EBHughsThe1st]

Nope. Thanksgiving was a celebration of a meal between native americans and the colonials in the early days of America.

Sure, it was another big event that happened to be in the course of early american history, but it doesn't really clash due to the rituals and the fact that people don't really fly the red white and blue as frequently as they do on independence day.

Also, those holidays are bullshit. Technically, we could be out on those days, but no one celebrates them. Or, at least, no one I know. We do get Martin Luther King Jr. Day and President's Day off, though.

But not arbor day or any other arbitrary one-person-is-going-to-celebrate this "holiday". Heck, some on each respective month's holidays aren't even taken off.

Labor day, yes.
But not Valentines, Halloween, or Saint Patricks. Strange, now that I look at it....

 

[Death God]

Independence day is about succeeding from Britain and Thanksgiving is about surviving the harsh conditions in the early stages of America. But yeah, America loves holidays.

 

[blalien]

When it comes to holidays, Americans tend to gloss over the details we don't like. We celebrate Christopher Columbus' birthday, even though he was a genocidal monster, and we celebrate Christmas, which is adapted from a pagan ritual, as the birth of Jesus. Ninety percent of the people who celebrate Thanksgiving have no idea where it came from.

 

[Peteron]

You clearly don't understand the meaning of thanksgiving. Also, yes, thats what Independence day is about...you know, the day we got independence? What else would it be about? And as for the "joke" you said about the various holidays we have. I haven't heard/celebrated any of those, and we don't get days off for most of them.

 

[archvile93]

Just to be clear, the point of Thanksgiving is not to celebrate Native American deaths, the Aztecs seemed to have that market monopolized. The purpose of it, from what I understand, is that it's a holdover from when people farmed a lot and had harvest festivals, which were very common in Europe at the time as well. Esentially, it's a harvest festival without the harvest. Also, very few of those holidays in that list you provided actually get people off work, only the major ones do. Honestly, it seems like the French get more days off work. Isn't it a national law that all businesses must provide a month of paid vacation a year or something there?

 

[Robert Ewing]

I never liked thanksgiving.

Mainly because all of my American friends are absolutely baffled as to why no other country on the planet celebrates it, and why I'm never in the thanksgiving spirit.

Sigh, this pattern is so common amongst Americans.

 

[Silas13013]

"we got those lobsterbacks to stop taxing us"

I never understood this either, and I go over Guy Fawkes' entire list of 'achievements' every time someone mentions him in a positive light. I then get told 'V for Vendetta. Go watch it'. But nobody ever elaborates further and I can't be assed to go see V for Vendetta.

In a complete derailing of this thread, I would recommend seeing V for Vendetta with the knowledge that the filmmakers had no idea who Guy Fawkes was. Good movie, will keep you entertained but I don't think anything in it could be taken seriously as praise for Guy Fawkes.

 

[Dan Steele]

Meh, I don't really celebrate any holidays. Most of the holidays I see in America are nationalistic anyway

 

[Lunar Templar]

Also, looking on wiki at your holidays ... do you guys have ANY days in work? You have a flag day, Women's Equality Day, National Dog Day, Washington's Birthday (what about the other 30 odd presidents you have had?) just to name a few ...

this only applys if you work for the goverment/bank/a CEO/some other overpaid jerkoff that is more or less is useless otherwise

but no, they don't, your miss understanding Thanksgiving

 

[Shock and Awe]

Thanksgiving is more about being grateful for what you have, this goes back to the Plymouth colony because it was supposedly their first successful harvest thanks to the natives.

 

[MaxwellEdison]

Also there are only 46 states, you have a few commonwealths ... such as Pennsylvania. The more you know ...

Actually, those commonwealths are also states. Otherwise, some pretty important parts of the Constitution wouldn't apply to them.

 

[Brian Hendershot]

We get like five days off man--and that's getting rare. Most places are making people work on Christmas Day and Thanksgiving. The only Holidays we tend to get off for (and this is by no means set in stone) are Christmas, Thanksgiving, the 4th of July, Labor Day and New Years Day. Of those days, most people for sure get Labor Day and the 4th off. So yeah....

Also, Thanksgiving is just a chance to get together with family and eat a shitton of food

 

[SeaTimeless]

Also, looking on wiki at your holidays ... do you guys have ANY days in work? You have a flag day, Women's Equality Day, National Dog Day, Washington's Birthday (what about the other 30 odd presidents you have had?) just to name a few ...

Not all of our Holidays are days off, we have days of observance, which is essentially saying "Hey you! Think about this briefly for a few minutes before getting the f*** back to work!" Which, barring the work part, isn't much different than days off...

 

[AnotherAvatar]

Our politicians and public workers barely have any work days due to all of those holidays, not something that is shared with the average Joe.

 

[Pojo-san]

So I was just watching that 70's show and a special thanks giving episode was on and it got me thinking, does "thanks giving" and "independence day" kind of clash ...?

I mean, 1 is celebrating leaving British rule and the other is kind of about about slaughtering the natives (as far as I understand it). Have I misunderstood or is it kind of "yay we got our own way!"?

EDIT: the bit below this is a joke! I know you all don't celebrate every holiday, for example: I doubt many people celebrate Kwanzaa besides black people.

Also, looking on wiki at your holidays ... do you guys have ANY days in work? You have a flag day, Women's Equality Day, National Dog Day, Washington's Birthday (what about the other 30 odd presidents you have had?) just to name a few ...

Independence Day is celebrating the signing the of the Deceleration of Independence. Which, funny enough, actually happened on July 2nd not the 4th. The 4th is when document was ratified and sent to King George if I have the history correct. Thanksgiving day is celebrated as a way of saying thanks to the Native Americans who have helped the pilgrims by teaching them how to survive in North America. Nowadays, it means being thankful for the things we have, and for the family and friends that are still with us.

There are very few holidays that we get off, and even then it heavily depends on what your job, what leveling of schooling you have, your religion, and a list of other things. The only days that I can think of that most of the US population take off are New Year's Day, Easter, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Every other holiday we work unless it's a holiday of your religion.

The United States is probably the most busiest country in the world when it comes to the workforce. Children are raise under the motto "Time is money." Which just means if you can't get your product made fast enough, your customers are going to go to someone else. You have to work fast to make any money. A lot of American business people hop from place to place very quickly. I know in Europe it common for business men to meet a day before the meeting to get to know each other more and then work on a deal. The US doesn't like to do that. We want to get it done now and move on to the next thing. We are only allowed two weeks of vacation time each year though depending on the company it could stack up.

This could be the reason why so many US citizens are depressed. We are so stressed from living this life style, but we have to live like this because it's a deeply ingrained aspect of our culture.

 

[Kuroneko97]

You misunderstand Thanksgiving. It was a peace treaty between two groups of aliens: the Pilgrims and the Indians. Recently the treaty was broken, and they went to war.

 

[AugustFall]

Also, looking on wiki at your holidays ... do you guys have ANY days in work? You have a flag day, Women's Equality Day, National Dog Day, Washington's Birthday (what about the other 30 odd presidents you have had?) just to name a few ...

Moving here from Scotland I can say that Americans work hard as hell. In the UK you get all the bank holidays and whatnot and work starts at 8 or 9.
Americans go to work at like 6 and if you haven't been working at your job for like 3 years don't expect any holidays. it's insane.

 

[minuialear]

William Penn wanted peace and largely obtained it, and set something of a precedent that PA would be one of the more level headed states and more well run ones.

Oh, the irony...

OT: Considering all your questions could have been answered via a ten-minute web search... [http://lmgtfy.com/?q=lmgtfy]