Valentine's Day: Awesome or evil? Kabous le Roux and Ryan Bubear brave the wrath of their significant others (and potential public humiliation) to debate the issue…

Kabous le Roux embraces the sentimental, scores some major brownie points with his wife and declares that Valentine's Day is awesome!

Valentine's Day sucks. Don't get me wrong — I'm actually all for celebrating love, romantic or otherwise. It's just the incessant whining that's getting me down.

You have those who recently broken up, all bitter and lonely, wishing death upon others who don't share their misery. Then there are the cheerless and desperate souls lamenting 'the fact' that they'll never ever find someone special to love and love them back. Oh Puhlease!

As if the 'recently broken-ups' and the 'I'll never find loves' aren't hard enough to contend with, you also have to deal with those who stress about whether this bracelet is 'too simple' or that pair of underwear is 'too sexy'.

And don't forget the fakers acting like they care, the ones only doing it out of a sense of obligation or — and these ones are the worst of all — the pathetic losers who feel so pressured by society they spend loads of cash on meaningless cards that say absolutely nothing about their 'love'.

People, get over it! It's not Valentine's Day that's making you miserable; it's you doing it to yourself! If you hate Valentine's Day because you don't have a date, stop spoiling it for everyone else and take responsibility for your own happiness for a change.

We all have relationships that can be celebrated. So, if you can't simply ignore Valentine's Day and let others have their fun, why not celebrate the relationships you do have in your life? You could, for example, invite all your single friends over for dinner. If you're like most people you probably don't tell them how much you cherish them often enough and a day like this is the perfect 'excuse' to do so.

Yes, it's wasteful to buy an expensive bunch of flowers. Yes, teddy bears are corny and nobody actually needs them. However, nobody is forcing you to buy overpriced chocolates and there's no need to buy gargantuan, red balloons.

Valentine's Day is not only there for lovers and you can enjoy it even if you don't have one. It's simply an excuse to say 'I love you' or even 'I appreciate you'. I mean, how often do we say these vital words?

Do you have parents that you love? Or friends? Or children? Valentine's Day doesn't have to be expensive and packaged in a heart-shaped box. And it doesn't have to be the worst day of the year simply because you can't stand the site of lovers being happy…

Ryan Bubear is the anti-Valentine — he hates cherubs and reckons that Valentine's Day boils down to the hope of coital compensation.

One of the stories contemplating the origins of Valentine's Day, paints the picture of a certain saint slicing open his own chest and sending his still-beating heart to an indifferent lover as a symbol of his undying devotion.

Romantic or psychotic? Hmm, tough one…

And don't get me started on that demonic naked midget with the itchy trigger-finger, fluttering around and puncturing the hearts of unsuspecting singles.

Saintly self-surgery and evil cherubs aside, it is plainly obvious that Valentine's Day has degenerated into an occasion of hackneyed gestures, often spurred on by the hope of coital compensation. That's right ladies and gentlemen; romance on this day is not true romance at all.

Yet at this time every year, otherwise miserable couples feign true love in typical Hallmark fashion. Don't get me wrong, I am well aware that there are bona fide soul-mates out there (see you tonight, honey!) but the reality is that these lucky few don't feel obliged to wait for the calendar to roll around to 14 February to reveal their feelings. And further still, they don't feel compelled to fall into the traps strewn across money-mad malls.

Besides, in the current economic turmoil, who can afford to succumb to the often month-long barrage of Valentine's Day commercialism? Back when Geoffrey Chaucer was a pimply teenager, homemade VD cards (and I don't mean the "I'm sorry you got infected" version here) were intimate, personal and cherished. By contrast, today's versions are mass-produced, emotionless scraps of recycled cardboard, often backed up with a bunch of stiff, plastic flowers.

Quite simply, the day in question is now all about commercial gain. From retail stores to restaurants, just about every outlet has something red, fluffy or heart-shaped to sell you at an obscene price. Even hardware stores and security companies are trying to get in on the act!

Then there's the plight of the unattached, having their often already depleted self-esteems beaten to a pulp with teddy bears and three-packs of heart-adorned boxer shorts.

Another thing our ol' buddy Valentine has ensured is that the social pariahs of the world frequently experience a short but dangerous spike of courage come mid-February, only for their often-creepy advances to be rejected by their choice of unattainable targets.

So before you open that bogus Valentine's email card and have your PC infected by the latest stealth virus, ask yourself which your loved one would appreciate more: an unprompted, unexpected personal gift at some other time of the year or an overpriced piece of garbage on 14 February.

Valentine's Day: Awesome or evil? Share your thoughts below…