March 15, 2014

"If I’m going to kiss a stranger, I’d rather kiss a girl," said the female singer....

... who appears in the kissing video that got so viral before people discovered it was an ad. So... viral advertising is a thing we could talk about again, but I was interested in the preference of the singer. But it's only interesting if the singer (Soko) is not a lesbian. The quote is featured at the end of the linked NYT article, which says nothing about Soko's sexual orientation.

By the way, I have not watched the viral video that got 43 million views in one week. Why should I?

17 comments:

Shouting Thomas said...

I did watch it.

Kids always think that everything they do is entirely new, right?

Hippies did the same thing. Anonymous sex with a complete stranger was thought to be liberating way back in the 60s. Remember "Fear of Flying?"

The Weathermen institutionalized this. In their communes, they posted lists of sleeping partners and attempted to prohibit members from forming monogamous hetero attachments.

Why this stuff seems revolutionary and liberating to kids is anybody's guess. It appealed to me when I was 18 too, although I can't remember why.

Maybe it's just the Year Zero thing. You know, revolutionaries are always trying to wipe the slate clean and start over from zero, so as to erase human corruption. Maybe, it's just that monogamous attachment signals the end of adolescence.

Why watch it? The interesting thing was to see how the kids approached the whole thing as if it were a classroom exercise directed by teacher. They are very obedient in their rebellion against conformity... as always.

Anonymous said...

The band's really gone downhill since Soko started hanging around.

The Crack Emcee said...

I didn't watch it either.

Untalented exhibitionists are the norm now.

ST is their king.

Shouting Thomas said...

I'd respond, Crack, but I gotta do my yoga!

Shouting Thomas said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Shouting Thomas said...

For medicinal purposes only, of course.

I'll be sure not to meditate!

madAsHell said...

If I'm going to kiss a stranger, I'd rather kiss a girl

Well.....daaa!

but I gotta do my yoga!

Irish yoga??

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

Yeah haven't watched that. Kissing strangers isn't beautiful or exciting; it's gross. Intimacy exists for a reason.

Mary Beth said...

The description sounded like Richard Renaldi's "Touching Strangers" taken a step further. I liked his photos and didn't think the video would be an improvement so I didn't watch.

While looking for something else on YouTube, I noticed there were a lot of parody videos of it. I didn't watch those either.

Eddie said...

You might find it interesting, Ann. The awkwardness of the participants leads them to be wonderfully sweet and shy. That might make you expect meek kisses, but the kisses are fairly passionate. I read that as people thinking "well, if I'm going to invade their personal space, I might as well make it worth it for them." Of course, we only see the ones they show, and it is not a random sample, so trying to draw general conclusions about human nature might not be warranted!

Sam L. said...

Why not? Because it would be soooooo
unnecessary.

ALP said...

Well, Ann, if you want to understand the parodies of currently viral videos, you have to watch the original video - sometimes just a few seconds.

I only needed a few seconds of the kissing video to enjoy the parody of getting strange dogs to sniff each others butts.

Some parodies are definitely better than the originals and worth the time.

Anonymous said...

Because kids have no memory of anything else, of course. They also occupy the high ground in that they are living the hormonal fugue *now*.

It's not the hookups that bring you down anyway, it's the breakups that do real damage, and one eventually leads to the other.

With today's acceptance of gay relationships, I see in my world a trend of young girls taking refuge from het sex and the 24/7 porn culture in female on female stuff. It's almost the modern version of being a virgin or joining a nunnery. We had that a bit when I was in school, but it is vastly more prevalent now. (No, I don't just think it is more out in the open. I think the percentages have gone up. )

Unknown said...

You should watch the video to see the reactions of the women. Primal, wonderful and prima facia evidence of why it's important for a man to be a good kisser.

Unknown said...

You should watch the video to see the reactions of the women. Primal, wonderful and prima facia evidence of why it's important for a man to be a good kisser.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

Why would any sentient person find it interesting at all?

The Godfather said...

What Shouting Thomas describes from the '60's ("The Weathermen institutionalized this. In their communes, they posted lists of sleeping partners and attempted to prohibit members from forming monogamous hetero attachments.") is essentially the same as what Huxley described in Brave New World, written in 1931. Gosh, radicals are boring! (So are conservatives, but we don't pretend otherwise.)