Thursday, February 07, 2008

I Don't Care for Valentine's Day either but...

It's that Hallmark of holidays: Valentine's Day.

This post was prompted by:
Someone emailed KFOG and ripped into them for having someone on yesterday who talked about greener Valentine's day gifts. He or she called them hypocritical, since it's still promoting consumerism and if they wanted a good way to celebrate it then you should go on a walk together.

Yeesh, what a Grump.

I don't like V-Day as it's so hard on single people so on V-day I stand in solidarity with singles and don't celebrate it. But I think I and others should lay off on those who do.

I wrote this to KFOG:
Wow the person ripping into you all for being hypocritcal about V-Day, seems like they're unfairly directing all their frustration about consumerism at you.

Even though I'm in a relationship, I don't celebrate Valentine's Day, but the message I got from the Greener Valentine's interview was that if you want to celebrate it here's a way that you can participate in a more green way. There's tremendous social pressure to participate in Valentine's Day and I don't give anyone a hard time for taking part (especially kids - who really seem to enjoy it.) The thing I resent is how hard it is on single people and I do hope I follow through one year in having an anti-Valentine's day celebration for single folks, but still need to figure out how to make it non-condescending.

And I must say that it seems weird that the writer is blasting you for being commercial when you are a commercial radio station (Hello? Reality is on the phone and wants to speak to him/her). I think you all strike a nice balance.

Thanks for having a great morning show.
And before I wrote this I did some checking to see if Hallmark really did dream it up and the answer is No. Chaucer, of all people, appears to have made it up. Here's the Wikipedia entry on it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentine's_Day

Not to say that every single capitalistic enterprise hasn't jumped on the V-Day bandwagon screwing the guilt past the sticking point (to mangle a tired metaphor.)

And what a better time to plug the show:
My Sucky Valentine: Sour Grapes and bitter chocolates, Good writers on bad sex and tainted love.
(Soon to expire Yahoo listing here; craigslist ref here)

And the appropriate candy to go with it: http://www.despair.com/bittersweets.html

Anyway, enjoy the 14th whatever you do on it.

3 comments:

Elf said...

"I don't like V-Day as it's so hard on single people so on V-day I stand in solidarity with singles and don't celebrate it. "

So this seems like a slippery slope. Do you also not celebrate mother's day because some people might have lost their mother or not be on speaking terms with them or have a mother who hates them etc.?

Do you not celebrate easter because some people might not be christians and therefore the celebration of resurrection excludes or offends them? Or because some people might not be pagans and the perpetuation of pagan rituals on what should be a holy day might offend them?

Do you not celebrate president's day because some people might not like what the specified presidents did? Or be from a country who doesn't have presidents?

Where do you draw the line?

-ellen

Ellen said...

No, actually I don't have any difficulty drawing that line. I think you're being a slave to the beast of consistency instead of the goddess of whim. :)

Elf said...

I laugh. I go back to work.

-ellen