Personally, I blame Angelina. Or, rather, Dame Angelina, now we’ve restructured the entire, 2 thousand-year-old honours system to accommodate a foreign person within the realms of those ennobled by Her Maj. Just goes to show, the quickest way to a medal is to get an Oscar. As Sir Daniel Day Lewis just proved as well. Even if you’re not British, like Angelina.

But what she has done is redefine ‘rape’. Not so much redefine it as, er, well, er, make it illegal. No, make it more illegal than it was. Make it a very very VERY bad thing. And make it unacceptable in war. Even if its always been unacceptable in war. Now, when power-crazed, victorious armies lay waste to the rural villages of the vanquished, rather than indulge in the time-honoured ‘rape, pillage, plunder’, they will stop! And reconsider their intended actions in the light of several of Angelina’s speeches, which they would have seen on the news if they had tvs and spoke English. Speeches in wonderful, historic and beautiful venues, given to wonderful, beautiful and caring exceptionally rich people who all agree, in a rich and not-at-all-patronising way, that rape in the sort of situation that no-one present hearing these speeches will ever have the misfortune to witness, is a very naughty crime that must be stopped. So they’re all agreed at the Guildhall/White House/Grand Palace Strasburgh/wherever rich people meet and warring soldiers don’t.

So then the entire framework of social/sexual interaction is brought into question. If a Sudanese Islamist freedom fighter can’t rape his ‘spoils of war’ then can two students from Exeter Uni snog in the Union bar? Logical next step to the question.

And a journalist has now suggested that before kissing, permission should be asked for and unambiguously granted. To avoid misunderstandings. To avoid… well, to pretty much avoid physical contact, I’d think, after so much passion-killing. Though really, if we’re looking to create what is in effect a ‘kissing contract’, prior to any kissage that may follow on or be dependent on said contract, once validated, to be enforcable thereafter and henceforth in accordance with agreement and sufficient poutage…

Ideally you need a third party. To witness. Just as a safeguard against fraudulent contracts. Preferably a lawyer. Or two, really, one each, for impartiality. And perhaps a judge, adjudicator or arbitrator, just to ensure fair play by all the others concerned.Maybe a clerk of the court, jury, reporters, administrators and security guards. Isn’t Saturday Night at the Movies going to be fun with that lot in tow?

And all that, just to replace the system we used, back in the day, which was ‘gin & tonic’. And repeat. And repeat…

According to aforementioned journo-person, ‘attempted kissing’ is something akin to assault (with a deadly weapon; vis-a-vis lips). And who said ‘romance is dead’???

FYI; the only place where unauthorised kissing and rape are still acceptable activities are in goal celebrations at the world cup. Or so it appears.

GET A ROOM!!!!

A xxxx