Valentines for everyone
By Stanley Baldwin
Back more years than I care to admit, I was chosen King of Hearts for our fifth-grade Valentine’s Day celebration. Not that I was such a heartthrob. Actually the teacher rated us children for several weeks on personal hygiene. Daily, we had to come to class with our hair combed, our shoes tied, our eyes free of sleep, and our faces displaying no clue as to what we ate for breakfast. The boy and girl with the best records were eligible for King and Queen of Hearts. So I won. What can I say? It was the first and last time I scored big on my appearance.
A cute girl named Maurine, who was way out of my league, won Queen of Hearts and reigned with me over the distribution of Valentines. Every child got one from every classmate. This, too, was by the teacher’s decree. No child was to suffer the cruel indignity of watching, cardless, while more popular children worked through piles of envelopes.
I got to thinking recently how kind and wise that teacher was, and how ironic it is that a day uniquely designated to show love can become, instead, a vehicle for cruelty. Imagine a child mourning, probably silently, because he or she received no Valentines. Even inadvertent or “minor” cruelties such as those can cut deep and last long.
Today, cruelty cuts a wide swath through our whole society. It seems the words of poet Robert Burns were never more on target than they are today: “Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn.” Indeed, thousands of all ages cry themselves to sleep at night because of inhumane treatment. Thousands of workers dread going to work because of mean bosses or coworkers. Thousands of seniors suffer broken hearts because they are neglected by their own children. Thousands of people are ridiculed, ostracized, or verbally assaulted for no greater offense than failing to fit in somehow.
The sad fact is that society is markedly more cruel and unloving today than when I was in fifth grade. Back then we children went out trick or treating on Halloween all by ourselves and nobody gave it a thought. Our parents never even imagined someone might shoot up our school. People drove wherever they wished, with no concern about road rage. Trash talkers did not dominate radio. Congress was able to function despite differences of opinion. “Common decency” was actually common. And “civilized people” were actually civil.
It’s not as though there is no remedy for all this cruelty. Long centuries before St. Valentine became the patron saint of love, the great lawgiver, Moses, said, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus said the same thing and also gave us the golden rule-to treat others as we want to be treated. But living by these ideals does not come naturally and easily, even for people of faith. Especially in today’s mean culture.
My fifth-grade teacher was a faithful champion of a practical love-your-neighbor approach to life, and an example to the rest of us. We need to ask what neighbor-love actually looks like. How does it apply to the way we treat each other in the home? How we drive and behave generally in public? How we talk to each other? How we express our social and political convictions? How we think of and act toward those of other ethnicities or races? How we stand up for the vulnerable and exploited?
Here’s to Valentine’s Day. And a fifth-grade teacher who saw to it there were Valentines for everyone.
Stanley Baldwin is president of the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Humans. This article draws in part from his new book, “A Funny Thing Happened on My Way to Save Civilization.”