What Are Fifteen Reasons I Dislike Valentine’s Day?
Throughout most of my life, I’ve loathed Valentine’s Day. Aside from Halloween, I’m not really a big holiday fan. Valentine’s Day ranks near the top of holidays I dislike the most. Here are fifteen reasons why I’m happy to trash it.
- It comes so shortly after the exceedingly long Christmas holiday season.
Christmas is already celebrated for over a twelfth of the year. The Christmas season practically starts the Monday before Thanksgiving and doesn’t stop until at least New Year’s Day. Those holiday festivities are overwhelming, and then Valentine’s Day comes with only a couple of months in between.
2. Everywhere is so crowded.
Even trying to grocery shop around Valentine’s Day can be quite a hassle. When it feels like everyone is trying to shop at once and having to run errands, there’s a good chance that a few people you stumble across will be very cranky.
I’m also claustrophobic, so trying to maneuver through such large groups of people stresses me out. It’s simultaneously difficult to get out of the crowd. I walk faster than most people do, but there are always some slow walkers who choose to be in the middle of the walkway. If everyone stayed at the side, instead, people who don’t want to be in the swarm would be able to get past faster.
3. I’m sick of all the pink.
I’m not a fan of the color pink. With a few exceptions, dark and neutral colors draw me in the most. It doesn’t help that pink’s a color that people tried to get me to be into for a long time. I’ll only even wear clothing that has pink on it if it's not the main color. Valentine’s Day plays into the assumption that all women like pink.
4. Quite a few couples split around Valentine’s Day.
The number of people who break up around the holiday is way more than you might expect statistically. About 7% of Americans have ended their relationships on Valentine’s Day itself with even more breakups occurring around the day. While those relationships probably weren’t going well anyway, they don’t really make Valentine’s Day look exclusively like a day of love either.
5. There’s so much talk about romance movies and books.
Even though a lot of people like it, the romance genre doesn’t appeal to me. It’s more likely to be a major subject around Valentine’s Day and another thing you’re assumed to just enjoy if you’re a woman until you’ve stated otherwise. The ways they present relationships don’t really match my dreams of what I’d like a relationship to be like, so I think there just isn’t anything for me to enjoy in them.
6. People engage in countless PDA around Valentine’s Day.
Although I don’t think kissing in public is wrong, I’ve never enjoyed randomly seeing other people smooching. Valentine’s Day makes this event infinitely more likely.
7. Advertisements related to Valentine’s Day perpetuate outdated gender stereotypes.
I keep getting ads based upon the assumption that a man needs to make sure to buy a woman the right present to make sure she has the perfect day and will stay with him. They’re creepy in a way because they almost make women sound like property that men need to spend enough to maintain.
Additionally, I honestly think I’m the one in my relationship who’s least likely to remember Valentine’s Day, which completely defies the cultural expectation. It’s not because I don’t care about my boyfriend, but rather that the holiday itself holds little meaning to me. Ads keep assuming too much about what people will or won’t enjoy based on their gender, and not all of us match the stereotypes.
8. Sometimes being offered holiday food can be a surprising struggle.
Valentine’s Day is almost a guarantee that I’m put in the awkward position of turning down food that I’m not comfortable eating. As a strict vegetarian, a lot of candies and baked goods have ingredients I don’t want to consume. Most people, however, aren’t aware of the animal byproducts in some food items, such as gelatin and food coloring. Generally, people around me are understanding when I turn food down, but every now and then, someone acts offended. I also feel guilty when it makes someone feel bad about not bringing food that I eat. It has to also be challenging for people with allergies.
9. Heart decorations can be boring.
Most heart decorations just don’t excite me. I’d rather see images of skulls and spiderwebs alongside pitch black. Cute animal designs would also be great. I’ll have to admit that it still amuses me that heart decorations often look similar to butts.
10. The gift expectations are sometimes stressful.
I feel like I should be trying to find my boyfriend just the right present. He’s said that I don’t have to get him anything. Of course, that’s not something I’d feel okay with. Trying to decide what to get is a struggle because I can’t afford the electronics that he really loves and which I’d like to be able to purchase for him.
11. The holiday contributes to environmental damage.
Valentine’s Day inevitably means more trash with many items that people receive being more heavily packaged than usual in order to make them look prettier. It pollutes the planet, and animals can die from eating the plastic waste produced.
12. At least some of that extra chocolate people buy comes from exploitation.
Since much of the candy that people buy for Valentine’s Day isn’t certified fair trade, at least some of that chocolate is being produced from extremely unethical labor. Some people decrease their lifespans, literally working themselves to death to produce cheap chocolate for extremely little pay.
13. Valentine’s Day perpetuates consumerist culture.
It encourages the tradition of people who have the most feeling pressured to buy whatever they can even as others don’t have enough money to get by no matter how hard they work due to cruel economic systems.
14. You get acquaintances assuming it’s okay to ask about your romantic life.
When I was single, the holiday presented an opportunity for people to pry into why I didn’t have a boyfriend. It always made me uncomfortable. I never felt like I should have to justify being single, and I didn’t want to have to talk about whether or not I was seeing anyone. That topic was fun with friends, but not so much something I wanted quite so many people to ask about.
15. I wonder about the ethics of selling so many bouquets.
During Valentine’s Day, I can’t help but wonder how many of those flowers are sustainably sourced. To me, it seems so sad and wasteful to cut so many flowers. It’s the same reaction I have to tree-chopping around Christmas.
Due to many reasons such as sexism, environmental destruction, and aesthetics, Valentine’s Day isn’t a holiday I get excited about. I’d love it if Valentine’s Day weren’t so widely recognized. If you enjoy it, however, I encourage you to still take pleasure in the holiday.
I wrote in response to this prompt from Flint and Steel:
Work Cited:
Ballard, Jamie. “Here’s How Many Americans Have Broken Up on Valentine’s Day.” YouGov America, 13 Feb. 2020, https://today.yougov.com/topics/relationships/articles-reports/2020/02/13/valentines-day-break-up-relationships-poll. 11 Feb. 2022.