FUNNY VALENTINE.

I suppose it’s our fault really, the Marketing Dinosaurs, we started it. Then successive generations of marketeers saw the opportunities too and began developing, and eventually exploiting the celebrations. It’s happened not just to Valentine’s Day but Easter and Christmas too. I have no doubt the festivals of other cultures, more recently imported into the country, will go the same way in the course of time.
 
Valentine’s Day goes way back into Roman Times and spans the world, opinions on it’s origins, meaning and message has changed a number of times. Now it’s a major day for the greetings card business, second only to Christmas. It has been estimated that world wide over a billion Valentine Cards are sent each year. Big business! The event has spilled over into many other industries too, chocolates, sweets, flowers, theatre tickets, gifts of all sorts are made these days in addition to sending a card. It wasn’t so when I was a young man. Then you may have had the nerve to send a card to a girl you admired, (we didn’t say ‘fancy’ then it would have been considered disrespectful), but you would never think of signing it, it simply wasn’t done. Some girls sent cards but would never admit to having done so, some even sent a card to themselves, just to make sure they had at least one card they could boast about. Their standing amongst their friends could depend on such things. 
 
For the boys it was all about secret, unrequited love. Something none of them would ever talk about even to his closest friend. On Valentine’s Day at school or in the dance hall the boys, especially those who hadn’t sent any cards, would nervously eye the groups of girls who, standing close together would be exchanging news about who had received a Valentine’s card (and who had not), speculating on who had sent it, and every so often all turn to stare at which ever of the lads happened to be nearby. He, dreading the thought they were discussing the possibility that it was he who sent a card to one of their number and were discussing it, would hastily vacate the area with a bright red face pursued by screams of laughter from the girls.. You had to be careful, if the boys discovered you had sent one they called you a cissy and if the girls found out……well you never heard the last of it, particularly from those who had not been the object of your admiration. Even the boys most popular with the girls would deny sending cards, but left a vague impression that they might have. On balance, it was much safer not to send a Valentine’s card in those days.
  
The modern marketeers have changed the traditional message of the day to widen the number of products they can put into the shops. Now a card can be sent to friends of either sex, even relations, anyone really, and of course most do not profess undying love or plead with the recipient to “Be my Valentine”. Most cards instead send wishes for a “Happy Valentine’s Day”. On that basis a card could be sent by anyone to everyone on any day to wish them a happy day, there are thousands of Saints days in the calendar on which to hang a hat. What nonsense and how sad, it takes all the fun out of the occasion. It is now quite difficult to find a card that simply says, “Be my Valentine”, and that carries an appropriate verse, or maintains the ‘secret admirer’ stance. No! The whole thing has changed beyond recognition and in my view not for the better. Romance…….? R.I.P. 
 
Rather more serious are the changes that have taken place in the days leading up to Christmas. The twelve days of Christmas have been superseded by the three months of Christmas. The festival now seems to start in late October, sometimes even earlier, and for many people has little to do with religion. Here too the cards now carry a myriad of images and messages but few depict the Christian Story and whereas presents in days past were of a modest nature and were given and received as surprises, now even children specify what they want and expect presents costing hundreds of pounds, often discarding them only months afterwards. It won’t be long before someone suggests that the ‘Christ’ is taken out of Christmas and the whole thing changed into something “More in keeping with the age”. I hope I’m not still around to see it. 
 
The same thing is happening to Easter. Hot Cross Buns were only ever sold at Easter when I was young. They were looked forward to eagerly, baked, sold and consumed in vast quantities from Good Friday to Easter Monday. Easter eggs and other items peculiar to the occasion appeared a couple of weeks before the weekend and, like the buns, disappeared immediately after. Now chocolate eggs are a standard item everywhere and all supermarkets stock Hot Cross Buns all the year round. Good Friday is remembered mostly now for the Treaty signed on that day in Northern Ireland. The religious import of the celebration has slowly disappeared. 
 
I suppose all three of these major events can be seen through the ages as marketing successes for one group or another, each organisation proclaiming it’s own message and establishing it’s own way of celebrating the event. But the latest manifestations of once religious festivals seem to me to have been achieved at too great a cost. In widening and developing these markets, their meanings have become obscured and are in danger of being lost altogether. Perhaps the marketeers should look at the basic messages again and re-invent the celebrations, using the best of all that has gone before and the best of ‘modern trends’ whatever they are!
 
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