Mother’s Day is a commercialized “Hallmark holiday” and needs to be removed from the calendar.
If you need to be reminded to honor a person who has devoted her life to craft you into the person you have become today, we have bigger issues.
We are nothing without our mothers.
Mothers should be honored every day, 365 days a year.
They are worth more than overpriced roses from the grocery store, mass produced greeting cards and an Instagram shout out. They are worth more than a single day of respect.
This is not a trend which millennials have taken over and destroyed. We have enough of those, but we wouldn’t dare do that to our mothers.
In 19th century America, the modern era Mother’s Day was conceived by Anna Jarvis in honor of her mother, a community activist who had cared for the wounded in the American Civil War. Wishing for a Memorial Day for mothers, Anna dedicated her life to this and made it a nationally recognized holiday.
Anna started a letter writing campaign, which led to President Wilson signing a bill in 1914 making the second Sunday in May Mother’s Day.
The holiday was meant to be spent in church after children would write letters to their mothers. Pink or red carnations were worn that day, honoring living mothers and white honored mothers who had died.
By 1920, the holiday was commercialized. Greeting card companies took over hand-written letters, and carnation stands were everywhere.
Anna had become enraged with what the holiday had become. She spent the rest of her life and family inheritance petitioning against the holiday, trying to abolish it.
According to the National Retail Federation, Americans will spend an estimated $23.1 billion on Mother’s Day this year.
The holiday has become the Kim Kardashian West of pop culture: company owned and designed. Injected with annual brand deals.
It’s not about the all-inclusive brunch with bottomless mimosas, the bouquet of overpriced roses that will die in a week or the diamond necklace that she didn’t desire.
The worst thing you can do is be mainstream for a person who is everything but that.
