I personally believe it’s completely corporately driven in an attempt to force consumers to spend money on shit they would otherwise not buy, but talking about that fact it like beating a dead horse. Any time it’s brought up I’m bombarded with criticism. “Sure you might be right but that doesn’t make it less thoughtful”, “you don’t have to participate, some people just want to show their love and appreciation for each other”, “it’s not about you!” I hear a lot of rebuttals to my hatred of this “holiday”, but let me focus on that final one. “It’s not about you”. You know, up until today I would have let that statement slide without any resistance, but today I’ve change my mind. I think it is about me. It’s absolutely and completely about myself and everyone around me that gets to spectate. Today is Friday the 13th. Today is Friday the mother fucking 13th and all day women have been receiving gifts of flowers, candies, serenades by paid singers. All in the name of Valentine’s Day. Unfortunately for those people it happens to be Friday the 13th. Valentine’s Day, for those of you who don’t know is on the 14th of February. So why are we making grand romantic Valentine’s Day gestures on the day before Valentine’s Day. If the 14th happened to be on a weekday this year sure you would get some hopeless romantics sending things to their SO’s all damn week, but a majority of us would send flowers on the 14th and call it good. This is why I think Valentine’s Day is absolutely about me. If the gifts were solely about the one they were sent to what need would we have for sending them a day early? Sure the gesture is about letting someone know you care about them, but it doesn’t stop there. Valentine’s Day is a perfect excuse for those with low self-esteem to yell all day at everyone the meet “I’M IMPORTANT!” This year has made it painfully obvious to me that Valentine’s Day, much like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and The United States of America is deeply rooted in vanity and self-absorption. If you sent a gift to someone at work today I encourage you to stop for a second and think about why you did it. If you conclude that it was solely for the love of that person then I encourage you to continue lying to yourself and finish off that cool-aid. If however, you are even slightly honest with yourself, you might consider apologizing to your SO for facilitating both of your vanity. Maybe take a homeless man out to supper and quit being a fuckwit.