BY LOUIS DENNIN
As human beings, we can all appreciate the overabundance of chocolates and sweets that inherently follow Valentine’s Day. Unfortunately, cheap chocolate hearts are just about the only form of mercy this nefarious holiday shows any who worship it, as if it were some sort of sacred prophecy. Barring the sweets, every other aspect of this “day of love” serves only to leech money from its love struck victims. It places overbearing pressure on people to open their vulnerable wallets, not to mention their even more vulnerable hearts. Valentine’s Day generates stress, heartbreak and a sense of havoc that everyone is better off without.
A holiday designed to honor and congratulates the “lucky ones” who have found a significant other is criminally discriminatory of the single folk of the world. It taunts them with a sort of “second birthday” that only the beautiful and the popular are allowed celebrating. Valentine’s Day, in the eyes of those who are single, is nothing more than a cruel opportunity for lovebirds to show off their successes in the battlefield of love. Whoever gets the most teddy bears, candy, jewelry and cards is reminded that they are worthy of Cupid’s blessings. For those who get nothing, it feels as if they don’t exist. Until there is a day to celebrate being single, Valentine’s Day has no right to come and make fools of those without a “significant” other.
However, Valentine’s Day goes far beyond mocking the single. For anyone who may have their eyes on a certain pretty face, Valentine’s Day fabricates a mythical urgency to act upon those feelings, often recklessly and for no good reason other then obligation to tradition. Some may argue that the confession of feelings on Valentine’s Day is “cute”, as if the calendar reading “February 14” actually alters the feelings of the person in question. But even if Valentine’s Day did magically make affection more attractive on that day, if you’re only “cute” enough to get a date on one day of the year, nothing you accomplish is going to last very long. Valentine’s Day is completely irrelevant to human love, and if it ever became relevant, love would become even more of a train wreck than it already is.
It’s not just the single people that Valentine’s Day terrorizes, however, as that’s not nearly enough nourishment for this voracious devil of a holiday. It is infinitely greedy for the suffering of people both single and in a relationship. As if handling birthdays, anniversaries and Christmas wasn’t enough of a living nightmare, Valentine’s Day has proclaimed that all people must purchase yet another present for their loved ones, and it better be good because your entire relationship (for some reason) rides on your capability to get a romantic trinket and pretty flowers simply because the calendar tells you to.
The buying of presents for a loved one would be so much more enjoyable for everybody if presents became random acts of kindness meant to surprise him or her in a nice way, but yet we insist on setting a date where lovers open their wallets for a card, a box of chocolates, a present and a lovely dinner for literally no logical reason. Of course, going to these lengths is completely optional. However if you choose to skip out on all the festivities, just be ready to be labeled an uncaring heretic for the rest of your life because you did not submit to Cupid’s iron fisted law of love.
Even though Valentine’s Day is an evil holiday that preys upon our weakness for love, driving us to the brink of insanity each and every year, people still seem to look forward to it. Valentine’s Day is celebrated today because it has snaked its way into our traditions and, if we’re being honest, it’s a good way for a lot of businesses to cash in. Valentine’s Day is not cool, and it hasn’t been cool since elementary school.
Elementary schoolers know how to celebrate Valentine’s Day right. Everyone has fun decorating their own little shoe box, then everyone contributes to a pile of candy and then most importantly, everyone actually gets something. For them, Valentine’s Day is just another Halloween (except pink), and everyone knows that Halloween is a wicked cool holiday. For the little tykes, Valentine’s Day is a day of sharing sugar with each other and celebrating a fun day in each other’s collective company. No drama, no greed and no obligatory presents that mean the difference between life and death. For them it’s a day of friendship and sharing, and that is something worthy of celebration.
Until we can wise up and be third graders on Valentine’s Day again, it will continue to be nothing more than shackles that chain us to the senseless obligation on our calendars- not in our hearts. But hey, the shackles are painted a very pleasant pink, so that makes it totally alright, doesn’t it?
