Is commerce ripping the heart out of Valentines Day?
A large number of number of people resent buying presents on Valentine’s Day, new research has shown In questionnaires, respondents said they resented capitulating to commercially driven pressure to buy lavish gifts for a partner. Others said that if people genuinely love each other, they do so always, and so shouldn’t be forced to spend money proving it on a specific day, and largely for commercial profit. Valentine’s gifts generated an estimated $13.7 billion in revenue in 2006 in the US. “Excessive and obligatory gift exchange traditions have sparked anti-consumption and alternative consumption behaviours in recent years,” says Angeline Close of the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, and lead author of a paper exploring the phenomenon.
