would you like a side of fries with that red-hot cynicism sauce you've been nursing?

however,
hershey's chocolates and the greeting card industry would not like you to know that in the production and distribution of their products, intended for transfer between persons experiencing feelings of love of widely varying degrees and entirely different types (e.g. fraternal versus carnal versus a combination of the aforementioned versus something else entirely), a great many expressions of ignorance, which could be considered ambivalence or even hatred, were transfered between beings experiencing feelings ranging from a need to earn money to pay the mortgage and to buy cheddar cheese for quesadillas for one's four-year-old to feelings of sincere goodwill and pride in having written the most beautiful and all-encompassing (or the most ironic) love poem that ever graced the airbrushed face of an embossed kitten hallmark greeting card.

nonetheless,

it remains true
that while hershey's chocolates and the greeting card industry would like you to know
that you are loved
and loved
and loved again
to the nth degree,
they would really strongly prefer that you
diligently remain ignorant of,
gracefully refrain from remarking on,
vociferously refuse to acknowledge,
and
politely turn a blind eye to
the plastic
the pesticides
the bleached rivers
the truck exhaust
the third world workers,
underpaid at best
the first world retail workers,
underpaid at worst
and
the total and utter confounding and confusing bizarre nature of a commercial industry taking license to indicate to entire populace of several million people that
on the count of
one...
two...
three...
we should all
LOVE!

and so i propose,
if i may be so bold,
to this multi-million person populace,
that on the count of
one...
two...
three...
we should all
burn the advertisements and
express love on our own timelines.

and on the count of
one...
two...
three...
we should all
buy more STUFF...

but to be discriminating.
(i mean, really....)

to buy stuff that was produced in
empowering,
non-profit,
unionized,
fair trade,
multi-generational,
worker-owned collectives
run by
differently-abled,
endangered,
lesbian,
dolphin,
political prisoners

of color.


amen.