Adopting the Western Culture-and Failing

I recently read a campaign being launched by a certain religious group which promotes Anti-Valentine. Now, I wont dig more into the religious group for obvious reasons, and neither will I promote Valentine’s Day.

Now, this Anti-Valentine campaign has somewhat irked me. As a curious blogger, I did my bit of research by observing people around me who support this campaign. Basically, the idea of the campaign is that VD isn’t part of our culture. They regard the fact that VD comes from the West and is associated with everything taboo with their religion – physical intimacy, which is why they don’t tolerate it. If you agree with the campaign, you should probably leave this blog, as the following may offend you.

Retract your lifestyle on a daily basis. When you wake up, you look for your coffee (Nescafe-Switzerland), watch the news channel (BBC-United Kingdom), take a shower in your posh bathroom (Toto-USA), enjoy some noodles for breakfast (Ramen-Japan), answer business calls using your smartphones (Samsung-South Korea) and get to work by your car (BMW-Germany). You get the idea. You are, subconsciously, already adapting the Western culture ever since you can remember. Therefore, the question of celebrating VD should not even come into question! The hypocrisy entailed completely obstructs the idea of freedom of action and democracy.

Irrespective of what religion and culture you hail from, you have every birthright to celebrate or ignore any holiday you wish!  Now personally, I don’t particularly enjoy Valentine. For me, it’s another Hallmark-made holiday. Everyday will be Valentine’s Day (VD) when you are with the right person. But, for those of you who enjoy the day, don’t let these campaigns bother you. You need not feel anti-religious or anti-cultured for wanting to share a special day with your loved one.

I think people here are culturally-confused. Also, they are not able to differentiate between westernization and modernization. So far, what they’re doing is westernization but absolutely zero modernization. Wearing low-waist jeans, crop tops and high heels means that you have adopted westernization. On the flip side, modernization is more towards a state of mind. Open-mindedness, freedom of speech, not being taboo towards physical intimacy, same-gender marriages (these are only a few examples) make you a person who has adopted modernization. This being said, people need to first adopt modernization before adopting westernization. Unfortunately, they do the complete opposite, leading to a whole lot of misconceptions, one of which is VD.

Of course, the above are based on my personal opinions and experiences. At the end of the day, we are encouraged to stand for what we believe in. It is good to have beliefs and viewpoints as long as we don’t enforce them to others. Following a certain religious belief does not grant you the right to be self-righteous.

Tolerance. Respect. Learn them. Practice them.

Cheers! XX