I’ve hated Valentine’s Day for a very, very long time. Only my parents really ever made it sucked less when I was still in high school, but that was about it. (Beyond the requirements in high school to get the coolest Valentine’s Day cards you could find – I actually miss that.)
But anyways. I hate Valentine’s Day. For a multitude of reasons.
The first (and most common) reason being that it is simply a Hallmark holiday, thought up by the greeting card company. (And this is for the most part true – I looked up the historical aspects of Valentine’s Day and only in modern legends does it link St. Valentine to anything romantic – the original Valentines and the original legends of St. Valentine mark them all as martyrs.)
My next reason for hating this day, of all days, is the expectations put on it. People expect their significant others to go all out for Valentine’s, showering them in flowers and gifts (namely, really expensive jewelry) and candies (which they’ll bitch about later because it makes them fat). The point is, that due to these expectations, people freak out about this ONE day for weeks or months prior to it, trying to figure out how to blow away their significant other this year, how to make it better than last year. And this happens every year. Because if you do something amazing one year, you have to beat it the next year or your significant other will be disappointed and let down. Or if you do something simple, your significant other will still be disappointed because it doesn’t live up to the movies. And heaven forbid you try to ignore the day altogether (while you’re in a relationship anyways).
And the final reason. People sit there and try to bitch at people who hate Valentine’s day (mainly because of the first reason – it’s a hallmark holiday, but a little of the second reason gets thrown in there for spice), because it’s a day about LOVE. It’s a day about showing your friends, family, significant others, etc., how much you love them and appreciate them and blah blah blah. This is my issue. Why is there only ONE day of the year where people are REQUIRED (by society) to pay attention to their significant other? Shouldn’t that be something you do everyday? And as for buying candy, presents, flowers, etc. – why is it necessary to wait until this one day of the year to drop all kinds of money, just because society says you should? I feel like if you really, truly love someone, that should be something you do randomly throughout the year – surprise your significant other with presents or flowers or candies just because you love them and want to remind them of that by surprising them and making their day better (it’s even better to do that when you know they’re having a bad day).
I think if you do that, if you randomly surprise your significant other with gifts during the year, then yes, it’s okay for you to do something extra nice on Valentine’s day, because it’s something you do normally, and you aren’t doing it because of pressures from society. But, if you more or less ignore your special someone more than you pay attention to them during the year, and then you fret over this one day, because you feel like you have to, then that basically just makes you a hypocrite.
