Don’t mind a bit of kissing but I don’t like that!

Married men who kiss me – just a peck – on the lips.
Wow. For real? That would get you a poke in the snoot in most of the circles in which I travel. Unless you were already pretty close friends with someone. But even then. Anglo-Saxons have got nothing on us Germano-Gaelic-Swedes for standoffishness and personal space issues though.

Double that, Minneapolitan. Ain’t nothin’ wrong with a handshake or a simple nod of the head.

First socialistsed health care and now kissing. It looks like the French really are trying to turn the US into the 101st département.

Next thing, you’ll be making wine…

In my (large East-coast city, bohemian) social circle, the peck on the lips has become the appropriate social greeting between both a man and a woman, and two women. The men seem not to have made up their mind how they want to greet each other – I’ve observed the hand clasp/one-armed hug, the cheek kiss and the ass slap, as well as the awkward dance of muddled expectations.

To me, it’s not what you do, it’s the way that you do it….

Hugging some men (or women) is like embracing a cadaver; as usual you head in purposefully, no wavering, with total commitment, (a half-way renegotiation is much much trickier). And then you get stiffed; no give, no take, just a taught inflexibilty.

Same applies for greeting kisses; I swear some people confuse the topology of their Kegel exercises.

My social circle includes some lip-kissers, and I find I don’t like it; there are some people who I’m perfectly friendly with who I’d really rather not kiss and of course some who I enjoy kissing, and it’s hard not telegraphing that distinction when I’m greeting them at the same time.

A head-nod goes to far in the other extreme. Part of the point behind these social rituals is to communicate a degree of trust and “I don’t consider you dirty”. Head-nod/bow does okay on the first one (I lower my head, I’m not looking at you, I trust you not to cut it off) but on the other hand it’s more of a gesture of submission (I lower my head and you can cut it off if you want to because you’re better than me). For the second you need SOME physical contact though (personally I think that the kissing on the cheek, or anywhere else, for that matter, is too much). A simple hand shake is a good compromise.

You’re the one who said “only” french. Maybe I’m being an asshole and overreacting a bit but the whole “Europe=UK + France” thing is one of my pet peeves.

@LizardBreath: if your name is anything to go by, I don’t want to lip-kiss you either.

I’ve lived in New York and now live in Montreal– both very kiss-greeting-oriented places by my New Hampshire standards. But I don’t think I’ve ever even witnessed a social-greeting lip-kiss.

I don’t think this has ever happened to me and that’s a good thing, because I wouldn’t like it. I reserve lip-kissing to romantic interests. Fortunately, I’ve never been kissed on the lips by someone I didn’t want to be kissed by as I think I tend to be pretty good about positioning myself accordingly.

The following is a somewhat different issue, but this discussion reminded me of it. Once when I ran into an ex I hadn’t seen in a few years, he held out his hand for a hand-shake. This caught me off-guard so much that I just shook it in return. But immediately after I thought: that’s crazy. We’ve slept together, shared a bed and now we’re shaking hands?! It seemed bizarre.

I think it can be shown deductively that osculatory salutation is socially desirable.

I. Let “attractive” be defined as “inducing a desire in strangers to kiss one.”

II. If M and F are both attractive, then desire is gratified on both sides. (Cf. William Blake: “What is it men in women most require?/The lineaments of gratified desire./And what in men do women most require?/The lineaments of gratified desire.”)

III. If F is attractive and M is not, then M’s desire is gratified and F has the satisfaction of gratifying M’s desire.

IV. If M is attractive and F is not, then F’s desire is gratified and M has the satisfaction of gratifying F’s desire.

V. If neither M nor F is attractive, then kissing allows one or both to believe that he/she may be attractive after all, or that the other person believes him/her to be, or that the other person believes only him/herself to be but is being kind. Each of these conclusions is gratifying.

VI. QED.

But even then. Anglo-Saxons have got nothing on us Germano-Gaelic-Swedes for standoffishness and personal space issues though.

How do you know when a Norwegian guy likes you? He looks at your shoes when he talks to you.

I do find hugging as greeting impolite and discomfiting, though. “You’re intruding on my personal space and you think I should hug you back? I owe you nothing, ” is the instinctive thought process that goes through my mind. And kissing as greeting? *shudder*

The only person who accidentally-on-purpose got in a sneaky lip-kiss whilst purportedly aiming for a cheek kiss was the bloke who later on because my husband. I’ll let him off for that. But anyone else – nuh huh – a cheek kiss (and a hug for friends) will do fine thank you.

The first several months I lived in Switzerland were filled with days of social greeting anxiety. Having come from the mid-west, a strong grip of the upper arm, much less a kiss on the cheek, was unthinkable. Now I really quite enjoy it. Having a little physical contact throughout the day makes life ever so much more pleasant. I feel sorry for my fellow Americans who shrink in fear like I once did – give it a shot folks, it’ll improve your day!

Now lip kissing…that would still make me uncomfortable. But I’d be willing to give it a try…

I’ve sometimes thought it would be helpful to have a guide that covered each country. With the number of places I’ve lived, I sometimes forget the local conventions when I return. I definitely know it’s two in Hungary (the country where I grew up for the most part), but even there I think sometimes I get the initial side wrong these days.

Wikipedia’s entry on cheek-kissing seems rather poor. This piece in Time covers some countries, but obviously excludes many others.

Chris, I saw the BBC piece, but didn’t find it that helpful, that’s why I didn’t link to it. (Instead of a discussion and anecdotes, a simple table would suffice here, assuming things are that straight forward.) The France map is great (but it suggests things may not be that straight forward).

I don’t like greeting people in lefty/bohemian circles (and of course as an anarchist I, alas, have to greet a lot of other lefty types). There’s always some little fashion, some typical left oneupmanship—oh, now the fashionable left doesn’t kiss on the lips anymore, or does, or gives high-fives, or whatever….you dull bourgeois cheek-kisser. And all this is strongly moralized; I’ve lost count of the various conversations I’ve had about hugging people and why it’s all good right and salutary. But what I’ve always suspected is that it’s mostly about touching people you find attractive; and since I hate the set of reckonings about attractiveness–I hate wondering whether I’m getting duty hugs instead of desired ones, I hate hugging people just so that they won’t feel left out, I hate hugging people on whom I have undisclosed crushes, I hate getting hugged by people who are interested in me but in whom I’m not interested, and most of all I hate seeing my awkward male friends give creepy hugs to my female friends–I just hate socially-mandated hugging generally. And kissing. And so on. I mean, I have friends I hug, but that’s from pure enthusiasm when the mood strikes me. Gah. I hope this kissing business doesn’t make it to the provinces.

Thanks to Chris for passing on the entrancing combien de bises map. Can anyone explain the regional variations?

Ok, so here’s my story. About 8 years ago, someone who was a very close friend in secondary school came to meet me at my house (then in England). I hadn’t seen her for 14 years, and that had been a sudden and brief meeting on the stree — we hadn’t really been in much contact for 19 years. But we had developed a close correspondence in the previous few months. She came to my house, and my wife let her in, and therefore witnessed us seeing each other for the first time in all that time. Our eyes met, we both wryly grinned and said “hello” quietly, at a distance of several feet. We were delighted to see each other and neither of us doubted the other was delighted. My wife (American) was a shocked by the lack of affect/physicality/whatever. That’s how I want to greet and be greeted by people I care about. (except my wife and kids).

Kissing of any kind, and touching of most kinds is reserved for wife and kids, except, perhaps, for a bride I care about a lot on her wedding day, and perhaps a hug for someone I really care about to say goodbye.

In other words, the two Minnesotans upthread explained in a few words why I belong in the midwest. I had wondered.

Re:48, yeah, I saw that on King of the Hill

King of the Hill is a damn accurate portrait of small town/exurb Texas life, as someone who spent my first 20 years there.

I’m glad to hear it. It’s a terrific show.

Shiver. Nobody ever tries social kissing with me more than once: the intense flinch away and outburst of stammering is a sign that it is, perhaps, not a good idea.

(But then even handshakes have that effect to some degree.)

If this does come in, I hope there’s some giant sign I can hold up to say, y’know, NO THANKS ALL TOO CONFUSING KTHX or something like that.

To quote ‘The Great and Powerful Bobby Hill’, I find the comments in this thread to be,”Very, interesting! Sorry Dad!” Having spent several years living in a small bedroom, ‘Fox Box’, community outside Dallas, I agree that “King of the Hill’ nails it on pretty much every level. However, having returned to my roots in Middle Arkanstone, I’d have to say that in my social strata, the hand shake and hug are pretty much the standard greeting of familiars. Even the casual male/female ‘lip peck’ of someone’s significant other, is not in and of itself, considered a serious breech of protocol. The male/male, female/female thing…..ahh, not so much. But that aside, considering this is not exactly a hot bed of liberal tolerance, I’d say, as local greeting customs go, it’s fairly laissez-fair. Which is not to suggest that you can’t get your clock cleaned if you otherwise don’t show the proper respect. Which, in my opinion, is as it should be, no matter where you come from.

Note to self: knock Texas out before kissing Texas’s wife.

Seriously though, I’ve even seen a little of this (cheek kissing/whatever) in Texas (even outside of Austin…) , but it’s pretty rare… people are more likely to be a bit reserved.