You forgot Valentines Day

Amen! Some of us march to a different drum and begin with year in December with Advent, then Christmas, then epiphany etc. The church calendar shapes the year with real, not manufactured occasions.
Peter Sellick

I think about Christmas shopping about 22/12, and enjoy "Easter buns" in January because they suit my taste and most of the year I can't get anything similar. The retailers can do as they please; so will I.

It really pisses me off the way "commerce" hijacks everything in our society these days.
People complain, well they used to once, that "the church" tries to run people's lives.
Now it is "commerce" and all it wants is your money with no benefit at the end. At least the church offered eternal life.

I wouldn't mind if "commerce" would observe the protocols of Christian festivals instead of bastardising them for their own ends.

There are heaps of other things that could be exploited that aren't sacred and cultural. Invent some and leave the religious and cultural events to stand as they should be NOT what "commerce" decrees they ought to be.

I wonder if the Hot Cross Buns in January wheeze pays off - I will never buy supermaket buns these days, even close to Easter, as it is fixed frimly in my mind that they have been there for months. Old buns - yuk! If they are so popular, why not sell fruit buns all year round, and ones with the crosses just before Easter? When I was growing up, we always had Hot Cross buns just on Good Friday, and really looked forward to them. Now they have been so commercialised that I wouldn't care whether I had one or not, though I still enjoy a good bakery or home made bun if one comes my way.

I have been quite put off easter eggs too by the supermarkets - would happily not have any at all and although my daughter likes chocolate and therefore easter eggs, there is no magic associated with them any more.

Problem is, I don't see what can be done about it - I'm not in favour of legislating when easter eggs and hot cross buns may be sold, or when the Christmas muzac begins! At least in the USA Thanksgiving holds back the Christmas retail onslaught - or so Bill Bryson says. I just 'vote' with my wallet and boycott supermarket Easter products in toto, and try to spend less each successive Christmas. I think what bothers me most is that children are missing out on the special excitement that we used to have at Easter and Christmas.

I think we're all forgetting something here, that people do things of their own choice.

I suppose I fit into the category of the "unshakeable apologists for commodity exchange in any form", I mean geez I must be such a fool for believing in the idea of voluntary exchange, how COULD I be so 'silly'?

It's not a problem that some people go and buy chocolate/hot cross buns a few months early, or that they don't feel as 'special' when what you claim to be "the real easter" comes along. It so happens that not everybody is Christian, not everybody enjoys the same things and at the exact same time/level of signifance that you seem to do. If I want to take advantage of better prices for chocolate, then what's wrong with that? There is no exploitation, no coercion, only choice.

Nhicks, "commerce" in the way you're using it actually just means the general demands of society, for if consumers didn't truly want it, shops wouldn't do it. There's not really anything being hijacked, except for your own sense of how things should be, which doesn't really apply to other people.

Parents who want to preserve the 'magic' for their children should just NOT buy chocolate early, it's not hard to do. It's the only practical solution anyway.

Lastly, I'd just like to say that it only happens if you(collectively) let it.

volition wrote
Nhicks, "commerce" in the way you're using it actually just means the general demands of society, for if consumers didn't truly want it, shops wouldn't do it. There's not really anything being hijacked, except for your own sense of how things should be, which doesn't really apply to other people.

It's not the general demands of society.
It's decided by backroom people whom we don't know and who are not accountable to the consumer for the decsions they make.
For example you try buying christmas mince pies during the 12 days of christmas.
Bakers Delight and Brumby's cease baking them on Christmas eve and then if you want them during christmas season you need to have stockpiled them.
Who makes the demand cease for mince pies suddenly cease?
Why it's commerce of course.
Why do they decide to do such things?
Because they can and do.

Are you or I part of their decision making process.

Why can't you buy winter clothes in summer, society's demands or commerce's decision making process out of your reach and mine.

Don't fool yourself, you are no more free to buy what you want when you want than anyone else.
It's not a conspiracy, but neither is it value free consumer driven decsion making.