When the aliens come to our scorched, barren land and wonder what happened to its once flourishing inhabitants, they need only find a newspaper detailing Jdimytai Damour's killing to better understand our demise. The story has it all: A crowd of lunatics, riled up by weeks of Black Friday ads and lifetimes of in-your-face commercialism, stormed a Wal-Mart in a mad dash for sale-priced televisions, toppling and crushing Damour, a temp worker, under their feet. "Good riddance," the Martians will say, the article disintegrating in their claws.

Our current global financial crisis isn't a product of the mistakes of a particular class, but of the greed of everyone. Poor people desperate to own things they couldn't afford and rich people playing loose and fast with money that wasn't theirs find us where we are today: teetering on the edge of the type of disaster we've avoided for decades. Our want for things has now made it very difficult for many to continue obtaining those things, thereby putting the people who produce those things into such peril that they need to ask the government to give them money so they don't die. If money is the root of evil, the branches are shoddily built McMansions, wasteful SUVs and $4,000 TVs.

We can't afford this bullshit anymore. Being decadent forever is an unfeasible dream (absolute goddamn nightmare?), one that inevitably proves bankrupting in a variety of exciting, interesting and hollowing ways. Let's be done with it and let's start now, during the feed trough of American seasons, when the whole Western world gives gifts to prove that Jesus was a cool dude. This year, to hell with it all: don't buy things for people. Let your friends and family wake up on December 25, stumble to the Christmas tree and find its orbit barren.

"AdBusters already does this," you're saying, "and it doesn't work for shit." You're wrong. Not buying things for people during the holidays is better than Buy Nothing Day, because it works twofold: not only are you doing your part to not contribute to consumerism financially, you're also helping crush its emotional hold over pretty much every sad bastard in America by reminding your loved ones that you don't have to give them a new thing to prove you care.

But your girlfriend and kids will be mad at you if you don't buy them some stuff? Then maybe you've got the wrong girlfriend, and maybe your kids are spoiled brats. Anyway, I'm not advocating not reating anyone to anything nice over the holidays. But how about an experience instead of an Xbox? Spend your money taking the people close to you out to a nice, family-owned restaurant and enjoying the pleasure of each other's company. Or you could go on a quiet, relaxing trip to somewhere you've never been; you'll definitely be getting the biggest bang for your buck: I still remember seeing the magnificence of the Grand Canyon when I was 11, but I have no idea what I got for Christmas that year.