Valentine’s Day is fast approaching. Maybe you’re looking for a new way to celebrate, a way that doesn’t center around romance but instead making new connections at a Galentine’s Day event. You may even explore a floral workshop with friends or throw a red and pink party.
Or maybe you’re just anti-Valentine’s altogether.
Tania Zhuang is product manager and sole organizer for her community organization “Girl Dinner Social.” The community is a girl-centered events organization she began after experiencing unreliable friendships.
“I just started inviting some girls I’ve never met before from Bumble to attend my dinner parties, and we all became really good friends. So I just thought, you know, why not open this to everyone?” Zhuang said.
Since her expansion to the public, the community has grown and so have valentines-themed events that decenter romantic relationships. It’s part of the growing trend of reimagining the holiday, and Chicago is embracing it in its own way.
On Feb. 14, there will be an Anti-Valentines Day bar crawl in Chicago. Organizers describe the event with phrases such as “Who needs a relationship when you can drink?” and “Forget flowers and fancy dinners—this Valentine’s Day, we’re celebrating single life in style.” The event includes nine participating bars and clubs. Tickets include entry into the bars and a shot on the house if you shred a photo of your ex.
This may sound a bit drastic to some, but others like the new twists on a holiday dedicated to love.
“Some people don’t even have a group of friends to hang out with. So Valentine’s Day could leave people feeling lonely,” Tiyanna Stewart, a student at Southern Arkansas University, said. “I think that it’s actually good that we have things like anti-Valentine’s Day … because everybody deserves to be around somebody.”
Stewart says she doesn’t remember a time in which she spent Valentine’s Day with a significant other. Instead, she has opted to spend the holiday with friends and family.
“I’m a very big advocate for that. And I feel like, what better way to spend Valentine’s Day,” Stewart said.
Beau Lerner, a customer service supervisor at the Field Museum, echoes a similar sentiment. “If you are single, it’s better for you to hang out with all your buds on Valentine’s Day than for you to just sulk alone,” Lerner said.
He feels like dating apps have only contributed to the problem, making it much harder to find true love.
“I feel like it’s just a general loneliness epidemic,” Lerner said.“People are more single than ever.”
While loneliness plays a large part in people’s opinions of Valentine’s Day, some observers say marketing and the capitalist nature of the holiday also play a role.
“It creates unrealistic expectations for love and relationships. Second, it can make people not in relationships feel bad; and third, it’s forced commercialization,” said Paul Booth, a professor of media and pop culture and dean in DePaul’s College of Communication.
Booth says movements such as anti-Valentine’s have been around for a long time. He added that today, commercialization — and the notion that we have to spend money on the day to have fun — plays a large part in pushing people to participate in themed occasions like anti-Valentine’s.
Lerner agrees.
“Valentine’s Day isn’t so much a celebration of love as much as it is like a social purity test for couples where there’s all these expectations set upon, usually the boyfriend,” Lerner said. “It’s like a threshold you have to meet, if you’re a boyfriend who didn’t really do much for Valentine’s Day, suddenly, everyone in your friend group is judging him.”
While this is not Lerner’s personal experience, he said he has witnessed many friends “failing” on Valentine’s Day.
However, even with the pressures and the “anti” sentiments, Valentine’s Day remains popular.
“There are still plenty of people who want to celebrate Valentine’s Day and even more who will celebrate it even if they don’t want to,” Booth said. “Like it or not, Valentine’s Day is going to be around for a long time.”
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