Humor will not be tolerated!! -Portia

I was going to say, whenever I show up at one of Marduk's family gatherings, I get kissed by all sorts of people.

Marduk wrote:To all those who say that there is no non-romantic way to kiss, I encourage you to observe a Hispanic/European family gathering, and tell me how much kissing you see.

Yes, but it's not kinky kissing. Not that kissing is kinky, mind you, in any way, but it's totally a different form of it.

Um, CJ, I think the word you are looking for is "romantic." Other cultures kiss as a sign of affection - lots of different types of affection! - but most people in the U.S. only kiss in romantic relationships. It's just different.

Yeah, okay. Romantic kissing.

Point granted: who you kiss varies depending on your culture. But neither in my native culture (white, Southern, middle class Protestant), nor the East African culture where I live a lot of the time, would I *personally* kiss someone I wasn't romantically involved with. I suppose the only exception, now that I think of it, is babies under about two years old -- I kiss my 2-month-old niece on the forehead, but not my older niece and nephew.

Marduk, Bob says your family kisses non-romantically. Do you think that affects your view of romantic kissing? Do you see it as less of a commitment? (Sorry if that's a weird question; I'm just fascinated by cultural differences. Which maybe is why I'm--as far as I know--the only non-Mormon Board Board frequenter. I enjoy the culture.)

Emiliana wrote:Which maybe is why I'm--as far as I know--the only non-Mormon Board Board frequenter.

(Not the only one, but almost. But we enjoy the outside perspective, so thanks for sticking around.)

Emiliana wrote: Marduk, Bob says your family kisses non-romantically. Do you think that affects your view of romantic kissing? Do you see it as less of a commitment?

Well, I've said before, a lot of the things I do, I do because I've adapted to living in this particular society, although my natural tendencies are different. So I don't kiss anyone romantically unless I'm in a relationship with them; mostly because the girls around here see kissing as a big deal, and I don't want to come off stronger than I intend.

However, if it weren't the case that I lived in an area where most people are very apprehensive about any sort of physical contact, I'd be much more physically affectionate, including kissing.

Marduk wrote:However, if it weren't the case that I lived in an area where most people are very apprehensive about any sort of physical contact, I'd be much more physically affectionate, including kissing.

I would cuddle with everyone. Oh, how I love me a good cuddle.

Marduk, where are you from? Rather, what type of society did you grow up in? I'm curious now!

I'm half Mexican. I grew up not being able to sit down in a room without kissing/greeting every individual in that room first, even if there were 30+ people.

So it sounds like you've got at least two different cultures plus natural instincts coming into play ... Interesting.

A few years ago I had an odd cultural experience regarding hand-holding. I'd just spent a month in rural Tanzania, where same-gender friends often hold hands and no one thinks anything of it--homosexuality is practically unheard of, so it's just a sign of friendship. Then I spent a week in Amsterdam, and I saw two women walking down the street holding hands and thought, "Oh, hey, that's acceptable here, too!" ... It wasn't until several hours later that it occurred to me that it was acceptable for the completely *opposite* reason.

Does anyone on here actually not kiss their family members? Because that would seem really weird to me. But I consider romantic kissing and family kissing to be two completely different things.

I don't kiss family members. Ever. And we only hug occasionally. So there!

Going back a bit in conversation, how Mormons make a bigger deal about hand holding, I was once in a Social Problems class at BYU-I when the conversation tangented (which was quite normal) and we started talking about kissing and hand holding. The main guy in the conversation said that where he was from (I don't recall, back east or in the south, I think), kissing wasn't a big deal. At all. Like, it was almost expected to kiss goodnight on a first date. Just a peck, mind you, but a kiss none the less. Holding hands, however, was a Big Deal. It wasn't done until you were for sure committed. Another guy (from Utah/Idaho area) laughed and said that was ridiculous. Hand holding was much less committal than kissing. I happened to agree with him and thought the 1st guy's perspective was ridiculous. Kissing after every first date? I was shocked to find that a large chunk of the class grew up in a situation like unto Guy #1 and had to change their dating technique upon moving to Idaho. We did a quick poll of the class and found that it was very much a regional thing, not a religious thing, since all of us were LDS.

So maybe it seems like hand holding is a Big Deal to Mormons, but perhaps it's a regional thing and Mormons just tend to all live in the same general region?

NerdGirl wrote:Does anyone on here actually not kiss their family members? Because that would seem really weird to me. But I consider romantic kissing and family kissing to be two completely different things.

We don't in my family. Growing up we kids would kiss our mom on the cheek when saying goodnight, but I don't do that anymore (I'm not sure if my siblings still do or not). Romantic kissing is definitely a totally different thing, though, I agree with you there. (I thought it was funny that the non-romantic kind even got brought up, because we were talking about actions in the context of dating, and a quick kiss on/near the cheek when greeting someone is different.)

Dragon Lady wrote:So maybe it seems like hand holding is a Big Deal to Mormons, but perhaps it's a regional thing and Mormons just tend to all live in the same general region?

This seems fairly possible to me. Kissing goodnight on the first date (and well before hand-holding) seems very strange to me; however, I can't claim that that reflects on the region of the country I'm from (which isn't Utah/Idaho), because I didn't really date until coming to BYU.

LJ, the reason it came up is because we were discussing hand holding in a romantic context. It was suggested that it could be done in a platonic way, but kissing could not, ergo kissing was a bigger step in a relationship. I pointed out that kissing is done platonically, and there are even families (mine not included) who kiss familialy on the lips.

Marduk wrote:LJ, the reason it came up is because we were discussing hand holding in a romantic context. It was suggested that it could be done in a platonic way, but kissing could not, ergo kissing was a bigger step in a relationship. I pointed out that kissing is done platonically, and there are even families (mine not included) who kiss familialy on the lips.

Ah, okay, good point. We should clearly define what cultural viewpoint we're using here, given how widely cultural views on affection differ. I think most people here assume a generic American viewpoint, which doesn't include kissing in greeting, but as you've pointed out, other cultures do include it. (And as Dragon Lady pointed out, even within the United States there are large differences about the relative significance of hand-holding and kissing.)

mic0 wrote:I don't kiss family members. Ever. And we only hug occasionally. So there!

Some friends and I took an unofficial survey of our ward a while back. As it turns out, most people only kiss their spouses and the little kids in their families. But there were 2 girls in the ward who kiss all of their family members...ON THE LIPS!

We were horrified.

My mom used to be very loosy goosy with her kissing, but by the time she started dating my dad, she decided to save them for Mr. Right. She told my dad this, so he would only kiss her goodnight on the cheek. So, one night, my mom decided it was time and she turned her head as he tried to kiss her cheek. They liked the result a lot.

When we were little we'd (meaning Gio and I) would kiss our parents on the lips. By the time I was 8 I stopped kissing them at all, but Gio will still kiss our mom on the cheek. Our little brother still kisses our mom on the lips every night at 15. I personally think it's weird, but he's of the personality type that it's perfectly natural.