That's really rich coming from someone who just went through all my recent posts and down-modded them. You're a petty, vindictive little person, and you have some real gall to call me immature.
>You want to make sweeping blankets like "they all close at 5:00"
These are reasons that many people here, including me, have given you for why we liked the effect Walmart has had. You just refuse to accept it. The statement doesn't have to be true for all small businesses nationwide, just enough of them, and in a time before Walmart, which I'm quite sure you don't remember.
People downvote responses in discussions all the time its a standard part of HN. People downvoted my as well. I don't get upset or accuse people of doing it.
Nowhere have I refused to accept that people have valid praise for Walmart at all, nor have I begrudged them that.
What I have disagreed with are wildly exaggerated and patently untrue statements made about Mom and Pop stores such as "they all close at 5:00" and "They don't ever allow returns" and "they ever have any stock."
All of these things are wildly untrue. That's what I have disagreed with.
Every time one these absolute falsehoods is pointed out you move the goal posts, again saying things "The statement doesn't have to be true for all small businesses nationwide, just enough of them"
But again you seem more interested in arguing than engaging in a productive adult discussion.
You want to make sweeping blankets like "they all close at 5:00" and then you want to move the goal posts and say the discussion is only about "regular America" whatever that means or "back in the 1970s".
Replace New York with Boston, Austin, Los Angeles or New Orleans etc and the majority of businesses are still Mom and Pop. For some reason you have(incorrectly) equated Mom and Pop to mean rural America. Mom and Pop businesses are not the exclusive domain of small town America. Similarly they are not just a thing of the past as you keep referring to them.
It really appears as you have no interest in engaging in a discussion but rather just want to argue for the sake of arguing. Even your diction "oh please", "Spare me" and "bogus"? What are we in a dive bar?