V for...Valentines, Vaginas, Victory

Clearly, Valentine’s Day means a lot to Princeton. Every lamppost on campus is plastered with some sort of valentine paraphernalia, Frist was filled with tables selling “condomgrams” and valentine messages delivered with truffles, the art museum responded to the day with its “Failed Love” event on Thursday of this week, the U-Store and C-Store stocked flowers and balloons especially for the holiday, and the package room was inundated with flower-recipients on Saturday. Let’s not kid ourselves, Princeton; school shut down twice in one week—once for a record-breaking snowstorm and once for love.Maybe this shouldn’t be surprising. Princeton does, after all, have a bit of a reputation. I mean, maybe we should think about Valentine’s Day as a long-term investment. Better pick out nice flowers, guys, because if you want to join the ranks of married alumni, this may just seal the deal. So don’t drop the ball on this one, or you may find yourself on that three-year-long waiting list for a university Chapel marriage.But in all seriousness, there is a piece of Valentine’s Day that tends to get lost in all this admirable passion. Each year since Eve Ensler conceived of it in 1998, V-Day is celebrated all over the world, a day that recognizes the inextricable connections among valentines (no surprise there), vaginas, and victory. No, this is not the sort of Valentine’s Day victory with which many Princetonians are familiar (the “Yes! Finally scored a date who doesn’t mind that I wear pocket protectors and that I’m not a legacy or an athlete!” kind of victory), but rather a victory that promises to liberate women all over the world from an all-too-common cycle of sexual violence and slavery. A victory that entails raised awareness about such issues as female genital mutilation, legal mandates that deny women basic rights, and rape as a government-endorsed military tactic. A victory that is becoming less and less elusive as the world begins to stop and listen to the provocative calls of the movement.And so it’s encouraging to know that this side of V-Day does not go unnoticed at Princeton. I stood and watched as about twenty people sat in Whitman’s Community Hall, waiting patiently to find out if they could get standing-room admission to the final performance of the annual Wym-onstage V-Day production of Eve Ensler’s “The Vagina Monologues” this Saturday. The production was a force to be reckoned with—even a bat in the theater couldn’t stop it—and it was one of many V-Day events this weekend.But perhaps the most important thing to note is that this powerful anti-violence campaign is not separate from, but rather inherent in, the V-Day we have come to know and love. So enjoy the love that’s in the air, but remember that this weekend has a global mission as powerful as—and somewhat analogous to—that love. Because even if you don’t have a vagina, yourself, I’m willing to bet you know someone who does.(image source: www.vday.org)