Opposition to Valentine's Day is not hate

Submitted by Project2012 (United States), Feb 17, 2004 at 19:17

While I would defend any person's right to celebrate Valentine's Day, that does not imply that everyone should either celebrate or that it is an innocuous holiday.

The holiday's origin are pagan Graeco-Roman and, as thus, religious monotheists may find it distasteful and its modern day celebrations as garish. It is also a Christian holiday, like Christmas, and as such is a holiday that non-Christians should not be obligated to participate in or promote.

Finally, for Jews, Valentine's Day is (although it is not widely known) a day of terrible tragedy. In 1349, one of the largest single pre-Holocaust massacres of Jews took place on Valentine's Day in Strasbourg, France, where Jews, blamed for the spread of the plague, were burned alive en masse by the citizenry: 2,000 men, women, and children died on the feast of love.

So, when non-Christian religious leaders in America encourage their followers not to celebrate Valentine's Day, that does not mean that they are being anti-American, anti-Christian, or anti-Western.

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