Random Biggest Thanksgiving Myths & Legends (13 items)

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  (#9) Thanksgiving False Flag Attack

  THE MYTH: The U.S. government is planning a Thanksgiving false flag attack to advance their agenda of taking away our rights and/or starting various wars.

  THE REALITY: You can go back to 2008 to find various declarations that a massive false flag attack was going to take place on Thanksgiving of that year. The same vague conspiracy theory is rehashed every year, and is never mentioned when it doesn't happen.
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  (#1) Thanksgiving Has Been Celebrated Every Year Since 1621

  THE MYTH: Thanksgiving has been celebrated every year since its first occurrence as a joint feast between Pilgrims and Indians.

  THE REALITY: Up until the 1940’s, Thanksgiving had a spotty history of being celebrated. After the first Thanksgiving, commonly thought to take place in late September or early October, there were periodic celebrations of thanksgiving for good harvests among the 13 Colonies, and the First National Proclamation of Thanksgiving was given in 1777.

  Up until the outbreak of the Civil War, there were a random assortment of "national days of prayer, humiliation, and thanksgiving.” Some presidents issued them every year, some never did.
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  (#4) Dining in Gratitude

  THE MYTH: The first Thanksgiving was about two different peoples coming together in gratitude.

  THE REALITY: The first communal dinner between settlers and natives was actually a harvest festival. Any organized giving of thanks to God would have been a strictly religious service that was for white people only – and with no frivolity or joy allowed.

  It’s far more likely that the settlers were enjoying the feasting and games that celebrated a good harvest, when the natives came by, drawn by noise and shooting. They were allowed to stay, and a myth was born.
  
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  (#11) Stealth Halal Turkeys

  THE MYTH: Turkey companies are bowing to pressure from Muslims and secretly giving freedom-loving Americans halal birds killed in compliance with Islamic dietary laws.

  THE REALITY: The “stealth halal turkey” meme originates with the writer and noted opponent of all things Islam, Pamela Geller. On her website, americanthinker.com, Geller writes of militant Islam “on the march” as personified by turkeys being slaughtered to confirm to Islamic halal specifications. Geller reasoned that we were all secretly eating terrorist turkey, and to boycott Butterball specifically.

  However, Geller misses a number of points in her ramble, the least of which is that Muslim dietary laws are almost exactly the same as Jewish dietary laws, and few people outside of the most ardent white supremacists would balk at the idea of eating a turkey that happens to be slaughtered in a kosher method.

  While Butterball does certify some of its turkeys kosher, it would make little sense for all Thanksgiving turkeys to be certified either kosher or halal, as this would drive the price up. Also, eating meat that happens to be halal doesn’t make one Muslim, anymore than eating meat that happens to be kosher makes one Jewish.
  
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  (#3) Pilgrim Clothing

  THE MYTH: Pilgrims wore their usual clothing of black and white suits, and buckled tall hats and shoes.

  THE REALITY: This was actually a popular style of clothing in England, but not until the 1700s. It made its way into modern (at the time) depictions of the first settlers in the Americas, but it’s not what they actually wore. Shiny metal buckles would be far too expensive to wear simply as affectations, and black and white garb, also expensive to make, would have been reserved for more somber church services on Sundays.

  The other days of the week, early American settlers donned the motley and colorful clothes of people who wore whatever they grabbed before they set off across the ocean.
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  (#12) Black Friday is the Most Lucrative Shopping Day of the Year

  THE MYTH: Black Friday is the most lucrative retail shopping day of the year.

  THE REALITY: Despite the massive media hype over post-Thanksgiving sales, stampedes, and people humiliating themselves for 20% off a Blu-ray player, Black Friday wasn’t always the most lucrative day of the shopping season. The days actually leading up to Christmas see far more sales volume, and up until 2003, the Saturday before Christmas usually won the “prize” of seeing more dollars spent than any other day.

  In fact, before 2002, Black Friday never came in higher than 4th. But the relentless drive to lower prices and get more people in stores earlier finally worked, and Black Friday did become the busiest shopping day of the year in 2003, a dubious honor it’s held every year since, except 2004. The days leading up to Christmas still see massive spending, though.
  

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