Mandatory Valentines Lose Something in Translation

I love Valentine's Day. What's not to like if you've got that special someone who will show up with at least a heartfelt card or a little chocolate. But I'm really tired for the forced elementary school Valentine's Day experience.

When my daughter was in kindergarten, she was all about making the special Valentine's Day card holder -- the overly decorated shoe-box adorned with pink and red hearts with the big slot in the top. My nine-year-old still has that one from her kindergarten year and gives me the evil eye if I even think about popping it into the recycling bin.

But as a slightly more mature third-grader, my daughter has no interest in giving Valentine's cards to each and every child in her class, especially the ones who, shall we say, leave a little something to be desired in the social graces, such as not hitting fellow students and not being bullies. But take them to school she must for the obligatory Valentine's card exchange.

A meaningless, emotionless exchange of cheap grocery store 35-in-a-box cards that will get unceremoniously distributed to each child and then probably tossed in the trash within days isn't the kind of friendship exchange that is good for our kids.  Why should we force our children to pretend they love everyone they go to school with?  No one makes us, as adults, pretend we like everyone we work with at the office.

So, teachers, I am asking -- why do we make our kids to do this? I know it's nice to have a little break in the regular school routine, but by the ages of eight and nine our kids couldn't care less about these cheap tokens of forced affection.

My daughter made some very cute, handmade cards for her best friends and our neighbors across the street. And they are real Valentine's -- they reflect her true love and affection for these people and she made them with joy. The ones that must be equal and the same for all her classmates, even the ones who are mean to her on the playground -- not so much.

Isn't it time we stopped forcing our kids to pretend they love everyone they know, including the class bullies?  For Valentine's Day, and every day, we'd better serve our children by helping them to show their real emotions for their true friends and not force them to love everyone equally.

Joanne also hangs out around the blogosphere as PunditMom, which is also the name of her blog where she writes about politics and motherhood.  You can also find her at BlogHer, The Huffington Post, and others!

Original 50-something Moms blog post.