Valentine's Day has been a holiday for around 1,526 years, but do we really need to celebrate it? The name “Valentine’s Day '' originates from St.Valentine, whose feast day is on February 14th. St. Valentine was a Roman priest under Emperor Claudius II, who would create large armies which took men for long periods of time away from their families, making them homesick and broken-hearted.

As a result, Claudius II decided to ban marriage so he wouldn't have this recurring problem with his men. But, when St. Valentine found out about this ban, he started to marry young couples in confidence. The emperor eventually found out and put him in prison until his execution date, February 14th. While he was in prison, he fell in love with his jailer's daughter. Legend says, the day he was set to be executed, he passed the young girl a note from himself and thus the tradition was born.

The only reason Valentine’s Day is still acknowledged in society today is because it has evolved into a huge commercial holiday celebrated nationally. Valentine's Day causes huge success for businesses like candy jewelry companies, who make billions of dollars off this one holiday.

When you are in a relationship and it's Valentines Day it's been a tradition to exchange with one another. But most gifts can be wrapped in an extreme amount of plastic wrappers which around this holiday severely increases the pollution. About 180 million greeting cards are created, 36 million boxes of heart shaped chocolate boxes are made, and 198 million roses are cut during the Valentine’s Day season. Don't you wonder how many carbon emissions are created by all this?

It produces more carbon emission than driving around the world 3,993 times! This does not even include the amount of carbon emissions regularly generated from factories that use fossil fuels. Do we really need to waste money on Valentine's Day? Displaying our love to each other everyday is more meaningful than celebrating love once a year on this outdated and very polluting holiday.