hugging used to mean something

Sometimes, The New York Times Style Section, I'm just not sure about you.

Here are some of best lines from the Sarah Kershaw's article, For Teenagers, Hello Means ‘How About a Hug?’.

But now there is also the bear claw, when a boy embraces a girl awkwardly with his elbows poking out.

(Yes! These are best with glaze.)

There’s the shake and lean; the hug from behind; and, the newest addition, the triple — any combination of three girls and boys hugging at once.

(I kept expecting Ms Kershaw to throw some teenager triple stats at me.)

“If somebody were to not hug someone, to never hug anybody, people might be just a little wary of them and think they are weird or peculiar,” said Gabrielle Brown, a freshman at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School in Manhattan.

(What about that kid with no arms?)

But pro-hugging students say it is not a romantic or sexual gesture, simply the “hello” of their generation.

(As opposed to, oh, I don't know, 'Hello'?)

She added: “I hug people I’m close to. But now you’re hugging people you don’t even know. Hugging used to mean something.”

(Is this article really about something else? Maybe I still have Bonk on the mind.)