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a moderate defense of Valentine's Day
I'm not romantically involved with anyone, so I won't be celebrating Valentine's Day. In fact, Valentine's Day has seldom been personally much fun for me--even when I had a much more active romantic life than I do now, I often seemed to be single on the day itself.
However, I like Valentine's Day. To an extent, and with caution. Yes, I recognize that it can make people without partners feel lonely; I know this from experience. Yes, I know that like every other big western holiday, it's hideously commercialized. But I really like the idea of a holiday to celebrate romantic love. Romantic love is a wonderful thing; when I've experienced it, it has made me happy. (And yes, I also recognize that the concept of romantic love has a troublesome history, one mixed up with the disempowerment-by-idealization of women, not to mention the invisibility of same-sex love. But, you know, pretty much everything has a troublesome history. I don't believe cultural practices are always irrecuperably tainted by their history. Also? The position of women is/was not necessarily better in cultures without a concept of romantic love like the modern west's.)
I have no problem with people who dislike Valentine's Day and choose not to celebrate it. Unless they go around spreading the misinformation that Valentine's Day was invented by the Hallmark greeting card company or some other commercial enterprise; it's simply not true.
I do, nevertheless, find myself getting a bit tetchy at the insistent expressions of righteous loathing one sees every year around this time. Not liking Valentine's Day does not make someone better. There's no particular moral purity in it. And liking Valentine's Day in principle, liking romantic love, does not make me stupid, or naive, or a tool of the goddamn patriarchy. So I could do without the scolding, thanks.
However, I like Valentine's Day. To an extent, and with caution. Yes, I recognize that it can make people without partners feel lonely; I know this from experience. Yes, I know that like every other big western holiday, it's hideously commercialized. But I really like the idea of a holiday to celebrate romantic love. Romantic love is a wonderful thing; when I've experienced it, it has made me happy. (And yes, I also recognize that the concept of romantic love has a troublesome history, one mixed up with the disempowerment-by-idealization of women, not to mention the invisibility of same-sex love. But, you know, pretty much everything has a troublesome history. I don't believe cultural practices are always irrecuperably tainted by their history. Also? The position of women is/was not necessarily better in cultures without a concept of romantic love like the modern west's.)
I have no problem with people who dislike Valentine's Day and choose not to celebrate it. Unless they go around spreading the misinformation that Valentine's Day was invented by the Hallmark greeting card company or some other commercial enterprise; it's simply not true.
I do, nevertheless, find myself getting a bit tetchy at the insistent expressions of righteous loathing one sees every year around this time. Not liking Valentine's Day does not make someone better. There's no particular moral purity in it. And liking Valentine's Day in principle, liking romantic love, does not make me stupid, or naive, or a tool of the goddamn patriarchy. So I could do without the scolding, thanks.
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