Ok, so I don’t actually think “we” should ban Valentine’s Day like Iran apparently is doing. I’m all about freedom after all. But let’s face it. Valentine’s Day is a bullshit holiday.
Believe it or not, Valentine’s Day isn’t just another made up holiday created by the greeting card industry to make you spend money on their crap. It dates to around AD 500, and commemorates one (or, perhaps, several) early Christian martyrs. Why we celebrate love and lovers on a day when some dude got killed is unclear to me, but whatever. It doesn’t matter. Point is, it’s a real holiday. But that doesn’t make it any less bullshit.
Valentine’s Day is nothing but a gigantic “FUCK YOU!” to every person who hasn’t yet found the love of their life, or who have tragically lost their partner, or who have gone through a breakup or divorce they are still recovering from. Now before you write me off as just another raging internet nerd who can’t get a date complaining about the beautiful people, let me point out that I’m happily married to a wonderful woman and haven’t had a depressing Valentine’s Day in more than five years. But that doesn’t mean I don’t goddamn remember what it was like!
Even for people who have a partner, Valentine’s Day can be a pain in the ass. There is a certain type of woman who judges her worth based on the size and/or expense of the flowers and gifts her man gets her on special days like Valentine’s Day. This is the type of woman who drags all of her female co-workers (half of them probably still single) to her cube or office to show off the gigantic bouquet her boyfriend sent her. Nobody likes this woman. Seriously, nobody. Conversely, there is a certain type of man who goes completely overboard and gets his lady a car for Valentine’s Day, or something equally insane. Worse, he has it wrapped in a bow and driven to where she works so she can show it off to all her co-workers. Again, nobody likes this guy. First of all, you’re making all the rest of us look bad. My wife got flowers and yours got a freaking Audi? Second, stop over compensating already. For people like this–and there seem to be a depressingly large number of them–Valentine’s Day isn’t about love or togetherness, it’s about showing off. And that’s horrible.
Remember that scene in Major League where Jake, Ricky, and Willy are going to the locker room on the day of final cuts? They know if they have a red tag inside their locker, they’ve been cut. No tag, and they’re on the team. Jake, the veteran, tells the rookies Ricky and Willy, “Listen, no matter what happens, just keep it to yourself. You don’t want to be celebrating in front of guys who just died and went down to the minors.” That is what Valentine’s Day feels like to a lot of people.  Meanwhile, the rest of us pay no heed to Jake’s sage advice, and we rub their faces in it mercilessly. That’s pretty uncool in my book.
So yeah. Generally I’m against banning things, but I could probably get behind a ban of Valentine’s Day.
I’m curious to know what holiday — or, really, what event of any sort — would pass the Dave test here. It has to be something that nobody could possibly have a pity party about, apparently, and there are some goddamn dramatic people out there.
No, the problem isn’t Valentine’s Day. The problem is assholes — both assholes who rub their shit in everybody else’s face and assholes who spend more time whining about what they ain’t got than they spend dealing with their problems. And since assholes aren’t going away anytime soon, I’d suggest not cracking down on every silly fun thing just because it might set them off.
I agree Valentine’s Day is dumb as a bag of rocks, but then again, you and I are probably not the most typical people to judge this. I mean, for Christmas I gave you a book called “The Wit & Wisdom of Ozzy Osbourne” and you gave me some Metalocalypse DVDs and our home decor is basically replica swords, toy robots, framed comic strips, and too many amps. What I’m saying here is that if either of us gave the other one an Audi, it would be taken as a sign of a pretty major brain malfunction.
I consider Dave-ness a sign of a pretty major brain malfunction just on principle. And, I mean, you married him, so…