This Kiss, This Kiss

I just listened to a podcast interview with Kristin Cabot.

You know, Kristin Cabot. Or at least you think you know.

She's the woman whose life got blown apart in a matter of seconds at a Coldplay concert when she and her then-boss appeared on the arena kiss cam looking a little more than professionally acquainted.

The video went viral. Then it went more viral. Then it reached that level of internet fame where even people who had never heard of her suddenly had strong opinions about her character, her decisions, her marriage, his marriage, her job, his job, and probably her choice of shampoo.

Was I one of the millions who watched it? Guilty. In fact, I distinctly remember sitting at the lake with a group of girlfriends shortly after it happened. Within minutes, we were deep in the rabbit hole, dissecting the whole thing. How could they be so careless? How could they be out in public? And, perhaps most deliciously, she's the head of HR?

That last detail felt almost too good for people to resist. HR. The very department that often finds itself policing workplace behaviour was suddenly at the centre of a workplace scandal. The irony practically gift-wrapped itself. But listening to Kristin tell her side of the story, I found myself feeling increasingly pissed off with how quickly we can all move from curiosity to condemnation.

Because while most of us consumed the story as entertainment, she was living it.

There were photographers outside her house. Her teenage children were inside. Complete strangers felt entitled to call her and text her using vulgar language and even issuing death threats. Seriously people? Two seconds of kiss cam warrants death threats? What did this awaken in us? When she finally worked up the courage to leave the house and do something as ordinary as grocery shopping, she was confronted by other women who felt compelled to tell her exactly what they thought of her.

One of them called her a husband-stealer. People. SERIOUSLY? A husband-stealer?

It's such an odd expression when you think about it. It assumes that one person somehow took possession of another human being. It removes responsibility from one party while assigning ownership to the other. As though husbands are passive objects that can simply be carried away under someone's arm while everyone else stands around helplessly watching. Yet we use language like this all the time without questioning it.

What struck me most, though, wasn't whether Kristin was right or wrong. It wasn't whether the relationship was appropriate or inappropriate. It wasn't even the affair itself. It was our collective certainty. The confidence with which millions of strangers believed they understood a situation from a few seconds of video footage.

The reality, according to her interview, was different than the internet version (shocker). She was separated. He was separated—or at least she believed he was at the time. They were two adults navigating messy lives, difficult transitions, loneliness, attraction, bad judgment, good intentions, wishful thinking, or maybe some combination of all of it. Ooooh, I know! Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe it wasn't. Maybe it was both. That's usually how real life works. Hey, remember the phrase; ‘We’re only human after-all’?

Human relationships rarely fit neatly into the categories that social media demands. Most of us have lived long enough to know that people are complicated, timing is messy, and emotions don't always arrive with a fully vetted risk assessment attached.

But complexity doesn't perform well online. The internet has no patience for nuance. Nuance requires context, and context takes time. Outrage, on the other hand, is immediate. Outrage is efficient. Outrage gets clicks. So a complicated story becomes a simple one. A person becomes a villain. A moment becomes a verdict and then … then we all participate.

That's the part I can't stop thinking about.

Not the kiss cam. Not the relationship. Not even Coldplay, although if you're going to get caught having an intimate moment with someone, Chris Martin singing "Yellow" in the background is admittedly a fairly dramatic setting.

What I keep thinking about is how easily we now confuse visibility with permission.

We see someone's life unfold publicly and assume that gives us the right to comment on it, analyze it, judge it, share it, and distribute it to everyone we know. We forget that there is an actual person on the other side of the screen, maybe with children, a family, friends, a career and a nervous system. Someone just trying to do their best.

The truth is, it’s not really about making mistakes. We've all made them. It’s more that most of us are simply fortunate enough that our mistakes weren't projected onto a giant screen and delivered to millions of people before we had a chance to explain ourselves. What happened to Kristin wasn't just a story about a workplace romance. It was a reminder of what happens when a culture becomes more interested in consuming people than understanding them.

So, I challenge you and I challenge myself. Maybe the next time one of these stories lands in our feeds, it's worth asking ourselves a simple question. Do we actually know enough to have an opinion? And, can we convince ourselves we’re entitled to weigh in on them?

Because if the roles were reversed—if it were our worst moment, our mistake or misunderstanding splashed across the internet—I suspect most of us wouldn't be asking for judgment.

We'd be asking for a little privacy, a little kindness and a little grace.

Make that a button and i’ll smash it.