Kissing as affection
In modern Western culture, kissing is most commonly an expression of affection.
Between people of close acquaintance, a kiss is offered as a
greeting or a good-bye. This kind of kiss is typically made by brief contact of puckered lips to the skin of the cheek or no contact at all, and merely performed in the air near the cheek with the cheeks touching.
Such kissing is a common greeting in European and Latin American countries between a man and a woman or between two women but also by two men in the Middle East and parts of Europe. People sometimes kiss children to
comfort them or show affection, and vice versa.
As an expression of romantic affection or sexual desire, kissing involves two people kissing one another on the lips, usually with much more intensity, and for
a considerably longer period of time. In more passionate kissing couples may open their mouths, suck on each other's lips, or move their tongues into each others' mouths (French kissing).
In romantic
and erotic kissing, the physical sensations are often of primary importance. One might find it stimulating if their partner moved their tongue in small circles against their own, or bite the lips gently.
Kissing as symbolism
When not an expression of affection, a kiss is a largely symbolic gesture in that the purpose of the kiss is to convey a meaning, such as
salutations or subordination, rather than to experience the physical sensations associated with kissing. Kisses on the cheek as salutations are traditional in many parts of continental Europe, and the number of
kisses on alternating cheeks depends on which region one comes from.
Kissing may also be used to signify reverence and subordination, as in kissing the ring of a king or pope. A kiss can also be rude or done
for the sake of irritating or proving one's superiority.
A more ominous use of the kiss is as a symbol of condemnation as may be observed when a crime lord kisses an underling, in effect imposing a death
sentence upon that person, the ultimate "goodbye kiss" or the "kiss of death". Indeed, Judas is said to have betrayed Jesus with a kiss.
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