EDITORIAL - Crazy little thing called love

Allow us to wish everyone a happy Valentine’s Day celebration.

Love is a weird thing. When love is good it is very, very good. But when love goes bad, it can be bad enough to drive people to do stupid things. Regrettable things. Things that end up in the news; like that man who slashed the neck of his live-in partner in broad daylight after he got jealous she looked at another man. Or that e-motorbike driver who bludgeoned to death a man he suspected was having an affair with his wife.

While those are extreme cases, it is love itself, and not just those who practice it, that is facing many challenges these days.

Love is now easily taken for granted. These days it is so easy for people to fall in and then out of love, what with the technology we have available at our hands that makes it easy to reach out and touch someone. It makes it easier to say hello as well as goodbye. We don’t even have to be there when either happens.

These days it is also easy to mistake lust for love. And also much easier for us to act on those baser instincts.

But perhaps the biggest challenge to love is how it has become so commodified and commercialized.

Given how commercialized Valentine’s Day has become, it’s easy for people to come to the conclusion that we have to buy a ton of stuff for our loved one, that we have to break the bank to show our appreciation for someone.

All this misleads us into thinking that we have to spend a ton for Valentine’s Day to prove our love. While it is true that we have to make sacrifices for those we love, there is no need for us to fall into this trap or to lead others to do the same.

The modern times also fool us into thinking that it is only during this day when we should show our love to our loved ones. That it is okay to ignore them for the rest of the year.

Of course it’s wrong. Love and appreciation should not be limited to one day only in a year.

This Valentine’s Day let us stay true to the spirit of love and not get carried away by the hype.