What’s it all about anyway, can’t we show appreciation for our lovers/boyfriends/girlfriends/husbands/wives every day of the year?
A few people have[/url] expressed their thoughts on this matter, really it’s just commercial bullshit isn’t it. Much like Christmas has become a time for showing who can buy the most expensive and flashy presents, this is not the point…I personally can’t stand commercialism and all the beautiful original meanings of the mostly pagan celebrations it has destroyed.
The true origin of Valentine’s day and it’s history is pretty much unknown, there is a lot of speculation and ideas, but there’s no fact. It’s been around since Roman times and seems to have mixed Roman/Christian roots.
What happened to St. Valentine is also unknown and how the festival actually came about, but in Great Britain, Valentine’s Day began to be popularly celebrated around the seventeenth century. By the middle of the eighteenth century, it was common for friends and lovers in all social classes to exchange small tokens of affection or handwritten notes.
Some interesting facts according to the Greeting Card Association, an estimated one billion valentine cards are sent each year, making Valentine’s Day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year. (An estimated 2.6 billion cards are sent for Christmas.)
Approximately 85 percent of all valentines are purchased by women. In addition to the United States, Valentine’s Day is celebrated in Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, France, and Australia.
Cupid is often also associated with Valentine’s day, the child like winged cherub with the bow and arrow of love. The son of Venus, the Roman goddess of love. In Greek mythology Cupid is known as Eros, son of Aphrodite.
In UK when I grew up it was mostly known as a day where you send secret messages to those you admire or wish to date, good for those shy people, apart from the fact that the cards are sent anonymously, so the receiver doesn’t know who they are come. Those ‘popular’ boys and girls at school always used to get hoards of cards, for those sad kids, you just got 1….from your MOM. I like this concept, it’s kind of cute.
Nowdays those it’s just become another hugely commercial affair when roses cost 5 times the normal price, dinner costs you an arm and a leg and at the more expensive resturants you probably need to sell a couple of internal organs on Ebay to finance your food. It’s lost it’s true meaning, I learnt a good lesson when I was young. My mom told me she would scold me if I ever bought her flowers on Mother’s day, why because they are 5 times the price of any other day. She said she’d much prefer if I bought her flowers now and then through-out the year. It makes sense really, when I was small I used to make her a card from stuff lying around the house and perhaps pick some flowers from the garden, with hindsight I can see this is a much more meaningful thing anyway, I didn’t waste my money and I put some though and creativity into the process. For those aspiring romantics, heed this advice for valentines day too. If your S.O. (Significant Other) doesn’t appreciate this, then dump em…if you have a girlfriend expecting a Gucci bag or something expensive just because it’s valentines day, well it could be social convention or peer pressure..but it’s still a bad thing right?
Seriously get a grip.
Let’s show appreciation for each other everday, boycott commercialisation and if you really must do something, be creative, be imagination, be truly romantic, spending a lot of money on something tacky isn’t the way forwards, honestly.
The moral of this story is, Valentine’s day, STICK IT UP YOUR ASS.
More at: Anti-Valentine.[/url]
Cheers!
P.S. Chinese New Year report coming soon..
