Valentine’s Day, or the Feast Day of St. Valentine, is a modernized holiday celebrated by 21st-century couples and commercialized by the greeting card companies. But what is the real point of Valentine’s Day? LOVE.

Love in a romantic way, a platonic way, a familial way. Loving your friends and letting them know, getting flowers from your boyfriend, or buying discount chocolate the next week. These are all aspects of the freedom of just having pure emotional feelings toward others or yourself.
I’m single currently but have spent the last several Valentine’s Day’s in a relationship. The views of people who are in a relationship vs. not during this season are usually polar opposites. I personally love the history of Valentine’s day.

In a time where Christians couldn’t get married, St. Valentine would secretly marry Christians who were in love. He was a martyr who died for the acts of love he professed and taught.

He preached that love has no bounds and that there is no end to what love can prevail through. This has such a correlation to the modern-day struggles of love. Between online dating, stigmas of race and sexual identity, and even the divorce rate only growing, there is a definite dislike towards this holiday.

To those people I say, that’s fine too, but there is a cultural relevance to the subject. We are in a society where legally everyone can get married, but with lingering reproach on interracial marriages and scrutinized intersex marriages I think that Valentine’s day can help to better further a continuous and without barrier acceptance of love towards one another.

There was a day when a white woman couldn’t marry a black man no matter how much they loved each other. We ratified this insolence and continue to fight for the equality in ability of all races. We are still living in a time where people of the LGBTQ+ community are unable to be married due to prejudices and intolerance no matter the federal law that was passed.

Love is not something that only straight, cis, white people have. We have to expand it passed that and actually start to express and acknowledge the love in the world.

In a time where we have so much negativity and scandal, what is wrong with having just one day where we can ignore it all and just be with the ones that mean the most to us?

If that means curling up with your dog and watching a good movie, grabbing wings with the guys, having an elaborate date with wine and flowers, or even getting together with the girls and just dressing up for fun. This is what Valentine’s Day is about.

Women and men have historically been on opposite sides of the Valentine’s Day argument, but I know plenty of men who love planning dates and plenty of women who stay in and curse the holiday.

Having a pure feeling of love for another person in any form is one of the most human qualities we have. We run on love, whether we accept it or not.

Sarah is a junior English major and an Op/Ed Columnist for The Voice.