Chided by our Tubercular Lesson-Givers

Stuck in a never-ending monotone of being prone to both endless mockery of the non-French, and self-congratulation, the likes of the French left, cultural Marxists to a tee, have managed to bleat out a good one:

La bise, un rituel « so chic » qui déroute les Américains

or:

The kiss, a "chic" ritual that disturbs the Americans

It refers to the practice of greeting one another with a kiss on each cheek. So far as I can tell, they picked this up from Arabs of the eastern Mediterranean who somehow manage to be both homophobic and pan-sexual at the same time.

We’re “uppity” or “posh” for imitating the ”bizou-bizou” habit when we do, but bow to honor their ways at the same time. The same is never true of hundreds of millions of their fellow Europeans, such as the British, Germans, all of the Scandinavians, virtually every eastern European, Austrians, and a fair number of Spaniards, the Swiss, and the French themselves who do not instinctively greet those with a kiss whom they might only know in passing.

Non-kees-kess type, for than matter, include anyone else with an eye for hygiene, and those who would rather not be pick-pocketed by someone whose name they might know.

The sad thing is that the Rue89 writer actually takes a mention of it in the New York Times to mean that it’s a “debate”, as if their cultural practices were actually globally relevant. Strangely enoough, no-one makes a point of the near universal ambient ill-regard inhabiting their society, to the point that even the preferred term used for another form of affection is an imported one: « le hug » replacing the fact that nary a soul cares about anyone else enough to use the phrase « je t’embrace » anymore.