Hating Valentine’s

[Editor's note: This article is reprinted from our Valentine's issue of Feb. 15, 2013. It has been updated and edited to fit this year's Day of Love.] Today, Friday, February 14, is Valentine’s Day, the sacred day that intimate companions mark to celebrate their love and affection for one another. Ifyou’re thinking about making a study of how couples celebrate this day, the Muslim world and the milieus of the radical Left are not the places you should be spending  your time. Indeed, it’s pretty hard to outdo jihadists and “progressives” when it comes to the hatred of Valentine’s Day. And this hatred is precisely the territory on which the contemporary romance between the radical Left and Islamic fanaticism is formed.

The train is never late: every year that Valentine’s comes around, the Muslim world erupts with ferocious rage, with its leaders doing everything in their power to suffocate the festivity that comes with the celebration of private romance. Imams around the world thunder against Valentine’s every year — and the celebration of the day itself is literally outlawed in Islamist states.
This year, the Indonesian Ulema Council in Dumai, Riau, and the Education, Youth and Sport Agency in Mataram, West Nusa Tenggara, issued a dire warning to people against celebrating Valentine’s Day, stating that the Day of Love “is against Islam.” This is because, as the Indonesian Ulema Council 2011 judgment explained, Valentine’s Day takes young people into a “dark world.”
Malaysia’s State mufti chief assistant Mat Jais Kamos keeps his mind focused on that dark world and so, a few days ago, he ordered young people to stay clear of Valentine’s Day: “The celebration emphasizes the relationship between two individuals rather than the love between family members or married couples,” he affirmed, and department officials backed up his command by distributing leaflets to remind Muslims of the 2006 ban on Valentine’s Day issued by the state fatwa council.
In Islamic Uzbekistan this year, several universities have seen to it that students actually sign contracts promising not to celebrate Valentine’s.
In Pakistan on Valentine’s Day last year, supporters of Jamat-e-Islami, Pakistan’s main religious party, took to the streets in Peshawar to vehemently denounce the day of love. Demonizing it as “un-Islamic,” the Muslim protestors shouted that the day has “spread immodesty in the world.” Shahzad Ahmed, the local leader of the student wing of Jamat-e-Islami, declared that the organization will not “allow” any Valentine’s Day functions, warning that if Pakistani law enforcement did not prevent Pakistanis from holding such functions, that the Jamat-e-Islami would stop them “in our own way.” Khalid Waqas Chamkani, a leader in Jamat-e-Islami, calls Valentine’s a “shameful day.”
These Islamist forces in Pakistan cannot, of course, completely succeed in preventing couples from showing love to each other on this special day, and so many Pakistanis still cryptically celebrate Valentine’s Day and exchange presents in secret.
All these Islamic outcries against Valentine’s Day reflect myriad other efforts to suffocate the day of love throughout the Muslim War. For instance, in Aceh province in Indonesia every year, Muslim clerics issue stern warnings to Muslims against observing Valentine’s Day. Tgk Feisal, general secretary of the Aceh Ulema Association (HUDA), stated two years ago that “It is haram for Muslims to observe Valentine’s Day because it does not accord with Islamic Sharia.” He added that the government must watch out for youths participating in Valentine’s Day activities in Aceh. One can only imagine what happens to the guilty parties.
The Saudis consistently punish the slightest hint of celebrating Valentine’s Day. The Kingdom and its religious “morality” police always officially issue a stern warning that anyone caught even thinking about Valentine’s Day will suffer some of the most painful penalties of Sharia Law. This is typical of the Saudis of course. As Daniel Pipes has reported, the Saudi regime takes a firm stand against Valentine’s every year, and the Saudi religious police monitor stores selling roses and other gifts. They arrest women for wearing red on that day. Every year the Saudis announce that, starting the week of Valentine’s and until a certain day in the future, it is illegal for a merchant to sell any item that is red, or that in any way hints of being connected to Valentine’s Day. As Claude Cartaginese has reported, any merchant in Saudi Arabia found selling such items as red roses, red clothing of any kind (especially dresses), toys, heart-shaped products, candy, greeting cards or any items wrapped in red, has to destroy them or face the wrath of Saudi justice.