“It’s not about sex and all about the touchy-feely experience of snuggling up to perfect strangers wearing pajamas. The grab fests are called cuddle parties, and since they started in New York in February, hundreds of people have paid $30 each to touch and embrace others in intimate gatherings. Everyone needs to be cuddled, especially in lonely New York, say creators Reid Mihalko and Marcia Baczynski, who say it’s a good way to meet new and interesting people. But the rules are clear. The PJs stay on the whole time. In case things get too steamy, a small chime is kept on hand. Before the cuddling begins, the chime is struck several times so everyone gets the message. ‘We’ve never used it,’ said Mihalko, who said sexual arousal does occur.” —CNN (US)

(Thanks to jmalebranche and tasuki.y2k for the link.)

If you’ve ever been on a New York City subway at rush hour, you’ll know that it’s the utter opposite of a cuddle party. It’s more kind of a crush party. Instead of getting into PJs and embracing strangers, you all jam like human cattle into dirty old subway cars. You step on toes, elbow each other in the ribs, grope or get groped. You get blasts of armpit odor that make you want to wretch. Filthy homeless people try to shove through the cars collecting change. Sometimes fights break out — “You stepped on my Air Jordans, motherfucker!” It’s a nightmare, and the daily commute can make you feel like those poor souls crowded onto trains en route to Auschwitz and Treblinka. The subway may go all the way to Coney Island, but at rush hour it feels like it’s going to hell.

And it’s against that lurid background that you have to see what a cuddle party means to harrassed New Yorkers. It’s an opportunity to find the better-heeled strangers from the crowd around you — presumably they don’t allow bums into cuddle parties, and probably no one is so gauche as to show up without performing basic grooming rituals first — and give them a hug. It’s almost like apologizing for the brutality you showed each other during the daily grind. Maybe the next thing will even be guerilla-style cuddle parties, people who don pajamas and canvas the streets giving out hugs. Maybe the MTA will realize the civilizing influence of cuddling and devote a few cars on every train to the practice. They could line the floor with padded mats, and then commuters could go straight from bed to subway in their pajamas.

Then again, once you get the general mass of New Yorkers involved, you’d have to use something a little more persuasive than a mere chime to prevent the whole thing from devolving back into chaos. Girls would be groped, and guys would beat on each other in good Darwinian competition to get near the hottest chicks — all of which would mean business as usual, since that’s about what a rush-hour subway ride is anyway.

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