There seems to be two types of political junkies out there. The first being the insanely loyal all year round supporters and the second spring up in two waves; during primary time and then leading up to the general elections in November, especially around convention time. Within the two groups there’s a sliding scale of just how extreme the average Joe can turn. I almost hesitate to use the word “radical” here but considering the actions, it’s by far the most fitting word. At first, I didn’t see much of a difference between conservatives (meaning republicans) and liberals (meaning democrats) but it was quickly clear as to who was the more radical of the two. There is, most likely, a margin of error in my conclusions considering the vicious primary battle between Obama and Clinton but here are some of my observations on the strange world of ‘campaigning’ in a bookstore.
Thinking back on it now, my first experience with the two groups mentioned above was from the year round supporters. I was back in our calendar section, this being December ish, and I noticed that a couple of our calendars were turned over. At Borders we carry a large selection of calendars from nature to dogs to movies and seeing as 2007 was the eve of the general election year we had a bunch of candidate calendars. We had practically all the big runners, McCain, Obama, Hillary, and then their ‘smaller’ competitors, Giuliani, Romney, and Huckabee. All of them were made by the same company, I believe, seeing as they were all titled “Countdown to Victory”. Which, now, seems kind of funny, I mean what on earth are you going to do with a Giuliani or Romney calendar now. Sure, maybe back in December it seemed plausible that one of them could win the nomination but now? I’m sure these people feel really proud when they have a guest over and there hanging in the foyer is a “Rudy Giuliani Countdown to Victory” calendar. It’s the same with the bumper stickers; I can understand sporting your candidate’s sticker when it’s the presidential sticker but before the primaries are even over? No, no, that just makes for snickers along the highway. In any case, there I was with these, seemingly randomly selected calendars turned over. Oh how I was wrong. It seemed someone decided to not only turn over the Obama and Hillary calendars but to actually put Giuliani calendars over them after that. This boggled my mind to be perfectly honest. I asked around and found out rather quickly that our store, and I’m assuming most bookstores, are continually proved to be a battleground for political junkies. I guess it makes sense in a way, I mean these people aren’t about to actually go out there and debate or protest or do anything to actually change the political standing so instead they must lower themselves to flipping calendars and books too. This, I soon found out, was the first group striking. They do it all year long, usually attacking the politics section, flipping and rearranging the books they don’t like. Not only that, though, these amateur political activists take it upon themselves to voice their absolute fury to none other than the employees. I don’t know how many times I’ve been pulled aside by one of these people, it doesn’t matter if their liberals or conservatives either, they all have relatively the same thing to say: “I’m offended that you’re displaying this *insert liberal or conservative* trash! What? Do these slanderous authors pay you to put up their slander? I demand you remove it from display and put *insert liberal or conservative title* up instead.” Luckily, after many conversations like this I’ve managed to control the urge to burst out laughing and explain rationally why we have what we have up. We’ve been called a liberal store and a conservative store and, indeed, many of these activists say they’ll never shop with us again, only to be seen a few weeks later harassing another member of the staff or flipping more books. The only plus side about these year round junkies is the fact that there aren’t many of them, and most of their political attacks come few and far between, but the other group is a whole other story.
Right off the bat in January we began to see the first hinting of the wave that was to come. I noticed more and more books being flipped and more people deciding to voice their opinion and, at first, I thought it was just that the new year empowering the political amateurs. Certainly the first group is part of the waves that crash into our store around primary time but they go from amateurs to rabid junkies. Most of the time we don’t even get a chance to flip the books back around before someone from the other camp is there making their candidates stick out and hiding the opposing. I’ve always wondered what would happen if one were to catch their rival in the act of ‘defacing’ their books, would a fight ensue? Probably not. From what I’ve seen these junkies only have the courage to speak their mind to a worker who, under the decree of “the customer is always right”, can’t voice their opinion at all. I respect that everyone has the right to their opinion, this blog wouldn’t be here if we couldn’t voice our opinion, but sometimes people should keep their mouth shut if they don’t know what they’re talking about. One example sticks out in my mind. Obama Nation by Jerome R Corsi, note the childish play on words, came out and, naturally, it was causing quite the stir. I had someone come up to the desk and ask to see the book. I first thought she was another happy conservative wanting to purchase the book, but then I noticed the Obama button she was sporting. I thought this could go two ways, a.) I’m about to get chewed out for selling this book and having it on display or b.) she doesn’t know quite what it’s about. Sadly, both were correct. She was quite excited to get the book going out of her way to mention to me how handsome Obama was, but then as she read the inside of the dust jacket her face first fell then tightened in anger. I noticed this and tried my best to make a getaway, no such luck. I won’t go into exactly what she said about the author, the publisher, and Borders in general but it wasn’t fun. I’ve had to go and flip the books around again, sometimes multiple times, each day. Not only Obama though, the liberals fight just as dirty they hide McCains book or cover it with Hillarys books but the thing I find most entertaining about the primary junkies is the liberals. It’s possible that conservatives are the cause of a lot of the Obama/Hillary defacing but the majority, during the primaries, were Obama vs. Hillary or vice versa. If the Dems don’t think that their party is split all they need to do is go into any bookstore across the country. Hillary books covering Obama books, Obama books hiding the Hillary books, it’s outrageous. I’m just glad that the primaries are over, now at least, all I have to do is worry about McCain and Obama rather than dems vs. dems then again it could turn into something worse with November rapidly approaching.
To this day I don’t understand what flipping a book over accomplishes. Sure, it might cause 3 or 4 people to not see the book but when it comes to politics I seriously don’t think there’s much of a correlation between the books people see and the books people don’t see. Most people when they shop for a politics book they already know what they’re looking for, they’ve seen or heard of the book on the radio and even when books like Obama Nation are on display not very many people stop and take a look at it. America seems to be fed up with politics so it isn’t a surprise to me when someone passes up a political book for a fantasy or romance. It doesn’t help that 75% of political books are pure slander either. One last observation before I call this quits. From my, albeit somewhat limited, experience the majority of conservative activists that get the courage to speak their opinion also have it in them to try and save our souls from the wrath of god. These religious nuts are part 2 in Thoughts from a Bookstore.
