...Couples and their strange rituals have long been a spectator sport - there are few things more fascinating than watching how well people do or do not get along. King Arthur publicly kissed Guinevere at a pivotal moment of the Round Table soap opera; in the 18th century, avid subjects would queue for hours to watch Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette merely eating their lunch at Versailles. So wanting to see Barack with his arm round Michelle, or Posh and Becks dining out at Nobu is just in our nature. What we don't want (or need) to see, however, is what happens after Nobu. "That sort of thing needs to stay behind closed doors, really," says Jo Bryant. You need to use your judgment and decide what constitutes a fitting spectacle." Things to consider while weighing this up should include the number of people nearby and your venue's maximum occupancy, as well as your own noise and moisture levels...Here's the whole article, sparked by some rather public intimacy displays between Paris Hilton and her boyfriend at Cannes recently.
Are we getting too relativist and post-modern in our acceptance of public displays of affection? Or should we turn away from unfitting spectacles? And how about the straight privilege in all of this - same-sex couples get disapproval even from holding hands...
2 comments:
Somebody really doesn't understand how Versailles worked if they think that people queued to see Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette eat out of genuine interest in their relationship.
They also don't seem to understand that the Arthurian mythos is, well...fictional.
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