The Pros and Cons of Valentine’s Day

Skye Iwanski, Contributor
February 14, 2017

The Pros:

Not that you need an excuse to shower your significant other with affection, but this is a fun time to do it– romantic dates, like going out for fancy dinner or staying in and ordering a pizza.
Chocolate goes on sale the day after.
It’s got a cute colour theme.
Hearts. EVERYWHERE.
So. Much. CHOCOLATE.
Secret admirers might send you anonymous gifts, since it’s the day for that sort of thing!

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You can celebrate being single on this day too if you want, because you do what you want to, you independent rascal!
You can make valentines for your friends and shower them with affection.
If you want to do cheesy romantic stuff, this is the day to do it!
Meme valentines are either trash or hilarious (and either way, they’re generally pretty funny)
You can do extravagant things to surprise your significant other, or you can tape a little heart-shaped note to their locker. Either one is bound to get a really cute reaction.
Classmates generally bring in candy or desserts to share.
You don’t have to be involved in a romantic relationship to have a really good day.
Anyone with a voice and/or a musical instrument can serenade people! (Looking forward to those singing telegrams!)
You can throw an anti-Valentine’s Day party, if that floats your boat– it’s an excuse to have a party regardless of whether or not you like the holiday!
The communal sugar-high of Valentine’s Day is not a force to be underestimated in primary and secondary schools worldwide.
Tyler Oakley releases another Pride Jams compilation for this Valentine’s Day– Breakup Jams! Maybe that’ll cheer up our Cons buddies down there, huh?

The Cons:

Those going through recent breakups and bitter, jaded singles have to suffer the constant bombardment of love songs and excessive displays of PDA.
You cannot listen to the radio at all without hearing terrible love songs, like, seriously, it sucks.
Love becomes commercialized.
Our thoughts are with you, aromantics (people who don’t experience romantic attraction).
People named Valentino (or variations thereof) get a lot of crap on this day.
Single people get to watch all their friends who are in relationships be happy, adored, and loved, and feel alone and sad because they are alone on a day where it is celebrated for significant others to be together.
For those of you in long distance relationships… have a good Skype call.
For those of you allergic to chocolate or those of you who don’t like sweet things, there is a lot of free food floating around, but not a bite to eat.
This is some people’s breakup anniversary of their last relationship, so they get to be especially miserable today, watching all the happy couples and general shenanigans of love.
The sugar crash, for those who indulge, will be of epic proportions.
There are a lot of terrible movies that you are subjected to watching by your friends who love love.
Lots of your friends have dates and thusly cannot hang out.
Candy hearts really need better messages and flavours. And a texture that isn’t hard chalk.
Going out to dinner? That’ll be interesting…
Yeah, that one song, from your last relationship? The one that used to be your song? You know the one. Well, you’re going to hear it over and over and over again today. Welcome to suffering.
If you don’t have enough courage to talk to your crush, today is going to be more than a little agonizing, because it would be so cheesy to tell them that you like them today, but would it also be cute..? Ugh, I can’t decide…
If you work in a retail store that sells holiday-related items, guess what you get to see every time you go into work? So much pink, white, and red that you want to throw up.
People judge you for sitting on the couch and eating ice cream by yourself. Sometimes, ‘people’ is actually just you.