Reading and Language 20 Feb 2005 11:12 am
The St. Valentine’s Day Blog Massacre
Every year it’s the same damn thing. Some young single woman takes a bubble bath, dresses up, cooks herself a nice dinner, and writes a gloppy, overheated article calling it liberation. In some markets she’ll tell you about her special night of masturbation, too. Yawn.
So that’s a nice, safe topic. But if there’s somebody else eating that dinner, heaven help you when the disapproving academic feminists find you. (Perhaps you won’t catch the acfem-flak if your dinner partners are Y-chromosome-free. Otherwise, you’re “taking women’s energy and giving it to men,” as I was once told. *spit*)
Incidentally, those articles are almost always “How to survive Valentine’s Day when you haven’t found Mr. Right.” They’re never “How to survive Valentine’s Day when you are the widow of Mr. Right,” which seems to me like a significantly tougher and more interesting problem. But presumably advertisers aren’t interested in old ladies.
on 20 Feb 2005 at 1:05 pm 1.Canyonwren said …
I do see what you’re saying, but also think it all depends on perspective. Being a solo-Valentine celebrator every single Feb 14 of my life, I totally understand the men and women who have their own sincere or snarky single version of the day. As a matter of fact, I write about my solo thoughts as well. If someone’s annoyed by it, tough.
I think calling it “liberation” is pretty non-relevant to my life, but if someone is new to being single and approaching the day alone for the first time, it may feel that way. What’s wrong with that?
Of course, I think criticizing couples for celebrating is as silly as…well, criticizing singles for mocking it. Heh.
[Someone else on my friends list wrote all about the flowers, exotic sex and chocolate she received, and then pissily wrote that unhappy singles facing this day shoudl just "relax." My reaction was--huh? *You're* the one with all the endorphins buzzing from the sex and chocolates. Don't tell *me* to relax.]
on 20 Feb 2005 at 1:35 pm 2.Cam said …
It’s professional and semi-pro writers I’m talking about, not Suzy Random Blogger. Thus the use of “markets”, and of “article” rather than “post”.
Nothing is particularly wrong with it except that it tends to be the stuff of serious cliché. In my experience, it’s rare that a writer brings anything individual to it. Where are the single women who celebrate V-Day by going ice climbing? Now that would make an interesting article. But no, it’s almost always the Bubble Bath of Strength and Freedom. Every year around this time I can count on opening up a magazine or newspaper and seeing some reference to that damn fool bubble bath. It is as much a Valentine’s Day tradition as flowers and candy.
The combination of triteness and rapturous pseudo-radical self-puffery strikes a goofy note, especially in a professional publication.
on 20 Feb 2005 at 1:43 pm 3.Canyonwren said …
Well, maybe because ice-climbing is a little less accessible for the average woman, who may or may not have the knowledge, equipment or be in a location to do it.
I do see your point–bubble bath articles are boring and old news–but they’re also easy and sensual, which is sort of a V-Day thing. The kind of women who go out adventuring are going to do it anyway, but that doesn’t mean they still don’t get depressed facing V-Day. Sometimes, the simple pleasures really are the best. I love hanging out on the top of mountains, but if I’m feeling deprived *right now*, fixing up a Lush bath bomb experience with a candle and a glass of wine can be a lot more satisfying than planning on doing yet another hike alone.
on 20 Feb 2005 at 4:10 pm 4.citrine said …
What’s funny is I saw that ‘relax’ thing more as meaningfully applicable to people IN relationships, though not necessarily purely romantic ones (ie, dealing with other people and many kinds of love is difficult on any day of the year.)
The ‘How to Find Mr Right’ focus is probably the most aggravating media slant for me, worse than ‘celebrating one’s personal relationship/values that may or may not happen to be in line this year with something celebrated by the dominant culture’. What do men without partners do on Vlaneitne’s Day, or do they just not read maganizes?
on 20 Feb 2005 at 4:40 pm 5.Cam said …
“Blog massacre” refers to the bitching on that blog I linked to, btw. Perhaps I should have made it more clear that that’s the thing I find most interesting: that for some “critical”, “educated” readers, taking that V-Day bubble bath becomes a bad subject when there’s somebody joining you.
on 20 Feb 2005 at 6:01 pm 6.Wim said …
Mmm, I love it when I’m given a whole bunch of women’s energy. Next Valentine’s Day I hope to collect enough to fuel a whole fleet of yoni-powered phallic patriarchy projectors.
citrine: AFAICT, men do essentially the same things, just without magazines to tell them what they are. There’s “Wah, I’m soooo aloooone, I’ll do something indulgent”; there’s “Hah. I don’t need a woman to be happy! I’ll do something unusual”; there’s “I’m in a relationship and it’s SOOOOOO GREAAAAAT”; there’s the usual silent majority…
on 21 Feb 2005 at 10:25 am 7.Ted said …
Good point about widows. There’s a woman in our office whose husband was killed in Afghanistan last year. I cannot imagine what Valentine’s day must have been like for her.
I wish I’d thought (or read) about a bubblebath. It probably would have been better than what I actually did.
on 21 Feb 2005 at 2:39 pm 8.ferneyes said …
I think I will use “Bubble Bath of Strength and Freedom” as the title for my next compilation CD.
on 21 Feb 2005 at 3:43 pm 9.Cam said …
Hooray! I’d like to know what’d go on that CD.
on 23 Feb 2005 at 6:22 am 10.Leah said …
It’s me–the massacred one–lifting my bloodied head to say that I chuckled at the title of your post, and like your take on the subject. I had to mention it back at the source today. Hope you don’t mind.
on 02 Mar 2005 at 11:56 am 11.Cam said …
Heh. I’m glad you liked it!
This discussion has opened my eyes in at least one respect: it’d never occurred to me that anybody could use the reminder that they could take a relaxing bath on a bad day.