Wal-Mart’s latest tagline, incorporated into your logo on walmart.com, is “Save money. Live better.” Living better is no longer an option for Wal-Mart employee Jdimytai Damour, trampled to death in Valley Stream, NY on the day after Thanksgiving by crowds anxious to save money in “Black Friday” sales.

There is no acknowledgment of this tragedy on the home page of walmart.com. At the very least, give up a tiny bit of screen real estate to mourn Damour’s death.

I don’t blame Wal-Mart for the death; I blame the crass, greedy idiots whose hunger for $26 mp3 players and other such goodies led them to behave like a rampaging herd of buffalo. But I do blame Wal-Mart, and other retailers, for feeding the hysteria of consumerism that has come to characterize the holiday season in the U.S.. The apex of absurdity is Black Friday, when stores open as early as 4:00am so that people can be first in line to save a few dollars.

Wal-Mart has transformed the retail landscape of the U.S. In some cases, it has transformed entire downtowns by luring shoppers away from the family-owned businesses on Main St. to the can’t-beat-’em prices of the Big Box economy. Whether you love it or hate it, Wal-Mart is a leader.

It’s time for Wal-Mart to take the lead.

Declare that from now on, Wal-Mart will be open for normal hours, with merchandise at normal prices, on the day after Thanksgiving. Better yet, announce that from now on, Wal-Mart will be closed on the day after Thanksgiving. Give your part-time, no-benefits workers the day off, with pay. Give ‘em a damn turkey, or at least a pumpkin pie. Acknowledge that your workers are human beings worthy of respect, not fodder to open doors for the greedy hordes filling your cash registers.

Invite other retailers to do the same. Do so publicly. Take out a full-page ad in the New York Times, or the Wall Street Journal, or USA Today. Have one of your top executives give a speech at the National Retail Federations’ BIG Show 2009, their yearly conference, coming up this January. Declare the day after Thanksgiving Day Damour…a Day of Love.

Your customers will still buy Christmas presents. They just won’t do so in a frenzy that lands people in the hospital, or dead. Let your low prices be a way to save money, not an incitement to riot.

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