Was the idea of airing ones dirty laundry in public ever meant to be taken literally?

Images of a young couple in Dongguan who started quarrelling on the street before running out into a busy road on which she stripped naked and he stripped to the waist were published on Sina Weibo and picked up by Inewthings.

The microblogger claims to have followed the couple with his camera phone while all other pedestrians, shopkeepers and even motorists ignored them as they went past.

The man started stripping first but the woman was the only one to be completely nude by the end.

And – question the end, not the means – the couple ended up putting their clothes back on, hugging, and walking off arm-in-arm.

Maybe streaking does have some mysterious healing power for relationships that are on the rocks. In 2010, a young woman streaked on and around a busy street in Shenzhen’s Longgang District, claiming that she was angry after having an argument with her boyfriend.

It is not known whether that particular relationship recovered.

And last year another jilted lover took to a street in Shenzhen to do a cathartic striptease after her American beau left her.