Would you kiss someone of your same gender if it meant a six-figure donation to charity?
Last night, one lady got to plant one on Charlize Theron — for $140,000.
Theron, 34, took part in a live auction during a gala for the charity OneXOne in San Francisco Thurs. Oct. 22.
Theron was offering a trip to South Africa (she’s from there) including 2010 World Cup tickets. That’s what people were bidding on. She started egging the crowd on because “bidding stalled at $37,000, far below the $280,000 Jeremy Piven had just raised.”
To sweeten the pot, she offered up a 7-second kiss for $130,000 to a male bidder. “Swine flu is going around. This is high risk kissing!” she told him.
After one man bid $135,000, a woman upped the stakes to $140,000 — ascending the stage for a 20-second smooch as the audience counted down.
Yeah. You know that once the woman offered the hundred and forty, that was it. None of the men were going to bid anymore.
I’m aware of the google-bomb value this story has, and yes, I’m very, very ashamed of myself. But this question occurred to me: would you kiss someone of the same gender for a really big donation to a charity? Would I?
Society sees two women kissing each other differently than it sees two men kissing each other. I’m sure a lot of women out there are saying “eew” right now, but it’s true. Women kissing is more socially acceptable.
Which makes it an even better question for men. There’s an organization here in Baraboo that runs a homeless shelter – they’ve been hit pretty hard by the recession. I think I’d do it, if some guy offered them a large donation.
I almost just wrote: “if some guy offered them a large donation in exchange for a kiss,” and started wondering whether prostitution laws might have something to say about it. Even if they don’t it suddenly felt wrong to say I’d kiss him (anyone) in exchange for money, even if the money was for charity.
And now I’m officially way off the point of this post, which is:
Photo credit: Charley Gallay/Getting images for OneXOne.org. That’s the charity Theron was supporting.
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