Vinegar Valentine - Penny Dreadful - Callous Greeting - Mean Card

It has always seemed an unfortunate element of society that every year things get just a little fluffier. The toys children play with have fewer small parts and more rounded edges, the words we use are in spoken and written word become less direct, the media we watch is a little more politically correct. It follows that our greeting cards consistently become happier and more cheerful which on the grand scheme of things isn’t such a bad thing.

Things used to be different in the greeting card market however. Have you ever heard of a penny dreadful valentine? They’re insulting and mean greeting cards for the romance season that were originally distributed back in the mid 1800s’. Incredibly insulting, especially for their time, these cards were usually sent anonymously. The best part of the whole thing was that Sir Rowland Hills’ administration of prepaid postage didn’t begin in Britain until the 1840s’ so in many places people were still being charged when they received mail rather than sent it. So you could easily have just paid the post man for an anonymous insult.

Nowadays you can find a number of different online card retailers who are selling mean greeting cards. These are the present day Penny Dreadfuls’, though certainly not limited to Valentines Day. Some of them are crude, some sly and witty, some with great artwork and others with pictures that seem cherry picked from many unreferenced sources. You will find free e-cards, paid for e-cards, cards that can be downloaded and those that can even be mailed to the address of your target.

Truly has the Penny Dreadful become more sophisticated.