shut up and love

This has become my place to rant about all of the opinions I usually don't share with people because someone's going to get offended. Go me for not bothering to advertise this blog much.

Anyway, I'm really tired of people ragging on Valentine's Day. Much like Black Friday, I find it pretty ridiculous that people should rail on it because it's a highly commercialized holiday. Realize that it's only so highly commercialized because people buy into. Obviously, if no one wanted to buy things, no one would bother decking out the pink, red, and white decorations and going crazy. If you hate it so much, don't buy things. It isn't that hard, is it? And maybe the people complaining about it really don't buy into it (although I severely doubt that they'd turn away chocolate hearts on principle alone if they were offered some) and are just using it as another excuse to go on a tirade about how humanity is deteriorating and how people care about the most trivial of things.

I think people's perception of the holiday (yeah, so some people refuse to even call it a holiday; power to you, guys, but I'm rolling my eyes) change in stages based on age. In elementary school, V-Day was cool because you got nifty cards and candy. In middle school, it was exciting because lots of people were experimenting with and just starting out with relationships. In high school, if you were in a relationship, it was great fun, but if you were single, you were probably anti-the-holiday. And beyond that, I think most people either came to embrace it as a celebration of love or continued to scorn it as another commercialized holiday. Or there are a few people who genuinely don't care, though a I find that a lot of people that claim this will still talk/complain/act bitter about it.

I think the whole Single's Awareness Day thing is kind of hilarious too. I guess a majority of our society likes to label it a day for romantic love, but come on, I'm sure the number of platonic love relationships in the world far outnumber the former. When you were a kid, you gave those Valentine's Day cards to everyone in your class and couldn't leave anyone out. If you don't have a significant others but still want to celebrate, go hang out with your other single friends. Now was that so hard? Stop being so damn bitter about it. Or you know, how about use it as an excuse to finally ask the guy or girl out? It's an excuse. May as well use it.

People say that we don't need a holiday to express love, that we should every day and appreciate it every day. And sure, that's true, but is it really so bad to have a day dedicated to it? It's like Mother's Day and Father's Day. I sure hope you appreciate your parents for more days than that, but isn't it nice to have a special day set aside for them? I see Valentine's Day the same way. It's an excuse to sit back and think about and appreciate all the awesome people in your life, whether or not you're romantically involved. Why is this bad? And if you just happen to be buying lots of flowers and candy and glittery, heart-shaped balloons for the day, so what? Our economy's in a slump and needs the help anyway.

And that's my tirade. Shut up, stop whining, and go tell someone they're awesome.