St Valentine’s Day
Valentine’s Day is upon us, and this holiday in particular brings up unrestrained rage. Despite my friends believing that I have a severe allergy to love and human affection, it is my anti-capitalist sentiments that are triggered. Today, Valentine’s Day is a sickeningly performative love-drenched orgy of flowers, chocolates, greeting cards, and “ romantic experiences.” Yet it has not always been that way, its history is quite disturbing and slightly fucked up at times. It includes bestiality, nonconsensual whipping, and beheadings.
It originates from pagan and then Roman festivals, legends of martyrdom, and medieval rituals. The earliest links to Valentine’s Day can be found in the Roman god Faunus or his Greek counterpart Pan. A feisty little goat man with a raging boner and a willingness to shove said boner into anything and everything. He was connected to fertility, virility, and agriculture. As quaint as that sounds, he expressed his love towards mother nature by fucking anything in sight. Although he preferred chasing nymphs, he had no qualms about fornicating with animals or plants for that matter. I look forward to my next Valentine’s card with a hairy little man fucking a particularly curvy tree stump.
To honor the horny goat man, the Romans used to observe the Festival of Lupercalia. This started off slowly with the ritual sacrificing of a goat or a dog and then the skinning of the poor animals. Wrapped in the bloody skins of their sacrifices, the men of Rome would cut off parts of the hide into strips and commence running around the city like maniacs whipping women in the hope of increasing their fertility. Unrequested physical violence as we all know, invigorates the womb. There is no kink-shaming here at Folkloric, many people enjoy an occasional whip or spank, I would advise however to always ask for consent and try to use toys that aren’t made of bloody strips of Toto.
The next addition to the myth of Valentine materialized around 269 AD. The most widely accepted legend is that of St. Valentine of Rome, a priest who lived during the reign of Emperor Claudius II, defied said emperor and secretly married young couples. He was discovered, arrested and executed by beheading. Sweet and simple, sounds romantic, but I personally enjoy the blatant disregard of the law more.
How do you see the evolution of this holiday? I hope that this Valentine’s Day, a scary goat with an erection romances you with tender delight. But if I’m being real, I think you should steal a road sign for your beloved or break the windows of a governmental institution and/or bank.
[originally posted to Patreon on 14/2/25]
