Posted on 06/12/2009 6:27:49 AM PDT by FreeManWhoCan
In their endless campaign and their inherited duty to confound their elders, this latest generation of teenagers has adopted a new weapon:
Hugging.
As detailed by a recent front-page story in The New York Times, teenage hugging has become an epidemic stretching from one coast to the other. Girls are hugging girls. Boys are hugging boys. Boys are hugging girls and vice-versa, which is not really a new development, except that now the inter-gender embraces do not necessarily have ulterior motives.
“For Teenagers, Hello Means ‘How About a Hug?” according to the story’s headline.
“We’re not afraid, we just get in and hug,” a male high school junior is quoted as saying. “The guy friends, we don’t care. You just get right in there and jump in.”
“We like to get cozy,” an eighth-grade girl in San Francisco explains. “The high-five is, like, boring,”
One might think that the practice of kids exchanging hugs, not drugs — or slugs — would be welcomed without reservation and even with open arms by parents and educators. One might be wrong.
• A parenting columnist for the Associated Press admits that she is baffled.
“It’s a wordless custom, from what I’ve observed,” she writes in her book, “13 is the new 18.” “And there doesn’t seem to be any other overt way in which they acknowledge each other. No hi, no smile, no wave, no high-five — just the hug.”
• Experts have been consulted to delve into what this threat of teenage hugging is all about.
“Without question, the boundaries of touch have changed in American culture,” declares a Virginia sociologist. “We display bodies more readily, there are fewer rules governing body touch and a lot more permissible access to other people’s bodies....
(Excerpt) Read more at daytondailynews.com ...
I haven’t noticed that kids are disinclined to touch each other. The opposite appears to be the case. I don’t think that has anything to do with them sitting in their rooms on their computers. There is a lot of personal space invading going on. BTW I am a hugger, but I ALWAYS wait for the other person to make the move. If they prefer a handshake or simply a verbal greeting that’s what they’ll get from me. I’m a respecter of persons.
OK
No air kisses for the Dutch, they give you the real thing! barf!
I personally dislike the handshake. What with swine flu and cold germs swirling around, not to mention someone's sweaty hand, and you don't know where it's been or what it's touched...
Hugging is better?!
For us non-teenagers, can someone come up with something to replace the handshake?
Huggings were very big among girls when I was a lad (the 1980s-early 1990s). I see guys hugging, but they are usually coming out of Pottery Barn.
They better not come to our church services. Almost everyone hugs each other when they get to church (German LCMS congregation).
I can't take full credit. Our girls went to a Christian elementary and when our oldest was in 2nd grade her teacher really encouraged the sexes playing together... girls playing soccer and boys playing whatever the girls were currently into.
I subsitute teach and the first time I subbed at the elementary school I was on the playground all day. To my surprise, the kindergaten kids all played seperately, for the most part, yet when it came to line up to go back to class many paired up with their 'boyfriend/girlfriend' and held hands! One little boy came to me with 'girlfriend problems' saying "my girlfriend dumped me, what should I do". speechless
What's that, you say we're there already? Well, then, isn't it natural that kids would come up with their own way of getting the physical human contact that a social species needs?
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It means another reason to homeschool!
Isn’t that really just a part of a normal life and growing up?
Probably both, kids like to emulate their elders.
My prediction: butt sniffing.
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