Valentine’s Day is a day of love. A day for couples, mostly.
But today, we look at a side of Valentine’s most people never see, because let’s face it. If you love someone, you should show it every day of the year. If you ask me, this whole “holiday” thing has become about commercialization. All across the board. But. What do I know, really?
So let’s get back to Cupid Day. Do you know how Valentine’s day really started?
There are two well-known theories.
The first? Some believe the day derives from a celebration called “Lupercalia.” It is a raucous Roman festival on February 15. Oh boy, oh boy. The men stripped naked on this day and spanked young maidens in the hopes of increasing their fertility. Well, doesn’t this just sound like more fun than a barrel of monkeys, somehow?
The second, more popular theory begins with the Roman Emperor Claudius II. He was trying to bolster his army. Get their minds on fighting and such. So. He forbade all young men to marry. But wait. Young men wanted to marry. So. That rebellious St. Valentine came to the rescue. He defied the ban in the name of love and performed secret marriages for anyone who asked. Well, it turns out it was not so secret. He got caught, and for his disobedience, Valentine was executed on February 14 around the year 270 A.D.
As I mentioned — those are the two “well-known” theories. But what about the third?
Back in 1152, off the coast of England, a man named Valentine Brogan spotted a pod of Minke whales. His wife had died in a shipwreck one week before, and he was certain she was swimming among the whales. In the name of love, he dove into the water, heading out toward the whales, never to be seen again.
Which brings me to my suggestion in a change of the Valentine Venue. Yes. On Valentine’s Day, we should all be asking, “What about the fish?”
Some are pets here in America. But mostly, we eat them.
They are not our favorite either way.
As pets go, we favor things this way.
1 Dogs — 48,255,413
2 Cats — 31,896,077
3 Fish — 1,047,500
4 Reptiles — 366,900
As food goes, we eat it this way, yearly.
1 Chicken — 58 lbs / person
2 Beef — 56 lbs / person
3 Pork — 44 lbs / person
4 Fish — 16 lbs / person
Either path, we should be considering the whole fish picture.
If we take a look, science has, more and more, revealed that fishes are intelligent, emotional beings. It is proven. Yet. It seems we, as humans in general, don’t quite accept the findings. Because, unlike other animals, like monkeys, apes, or even dogs, or cows, fish don’t have faces like ours. Their appearance is almost mask-like. As such, we think that they do not experience feelings. The other thing? Fish cannot cry out. When we step on our cat’s paw, she shrieks like holy-heck. But fish do not. And we interpret their silence as meaning they do not perceive pain. But if we watch them, as their mouth gasp for air and their fins flop around on the boat’s deck, we might see otherwise.
Fishes are cold-blooded. Ectothermic. They began evolving around 100 million years before land animals. This is another reason we often consider them as “primitive” beings. But in truth, science has shown that they’re the most highly evolved of all vertebrates. And there are so many of them — 33,000-plus known species of fish in the world, if we are counting. And many of those fish possess incredible senses and abilities, some of which we are only just beginning to understand.
I’m trying to set the record straight. Like dispelling the whole myth about the goldfish’s “three-second memory.”
Fish can be clever. Those scientists say that some fishes can count up to five without fingers and toes.
Other fish recognize individual human faces. They studied them around their tanks. When the person who fed them walked near the tank, the fish paid close attention to them. But when some other Joe happened by, those fish just kept swimming. Merrily along.
Regardless of all of this, while measures have been taken with other animal food sources being slaughtered “humanely” — this is not true with the fish. Their conditions on farms, for living, and dying, are terrible. The same is true with many fishing practices. And that is heartbreaking.
So. On this Valentine’s Day, we should remember the fish.
This is the truth.
But the story about Valentine Brogan’s wife and the whales? I sort of made that up.
Love you. Mean it!
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“When it rains on the ocean it rains on fish too.”
― Matshona Dhliwayo
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Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.
— Henry David Thoreau
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All men are equal before fish.
— Herbert Hoover
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The cold blooded truth about Valentine’s Day
