NO KIDDING: THE SEQUEL.

Christian Toto follows David Marcus with his E-T-T-S moment at the cinema.  "Many of the 'new' moviegoers are behaving badly. They talk, snap selfies and conduct phone conversations mid-movie."

He didn't have to get to the inadequate concessions and the interminable previews, although a radio talker who conducted a group complaint based on the column elicited those.  (It's two hours or so into his August 3 audio archive.)

Rather, he saw as the bad behavior at the cinema the generalized decline of bourgeois norms.

Don’t blame the pandemic. It’s a societal issue and we have only ourselves to blame.

Look no further than a country that allows shoplifting to run wild in major cities. Criminals now get a slap on the wrist, if that, while citizens who take a stand get the book thrown at them.

Discipline in schools now falls under woke bylaws, meaning if a child belongs to a specific demographic he or she may get a pass.

Take one long, hard look at our southern border and you’ll see how easily we look the other way rather than obey the rules.

We no longer respect the rule of law, and that includes government officials and the media. What we’re seeing now shouldn’t shock anyone.

The toxic trend is arriving right on schedule.

That’s terrible news for the nation, of course, but it’s also bad for the theatrical model. Moviegoers who finally returned to theaters this summer now pay exorbitant prices for the honor of being distracted throughout a movie.

Instead, they’ll wait a few weeks and see the movies in question from the comfort of their home, just like they did during the pandemic. Theaters will only have themselves to blame if they don’t enforce strict but fair rules about in-theater behavior.

They won’t, most likely.

If big city mayors look the other way at rising crime rates, and voters won’t punish them at the ballot box, what chance do we have that theatrical managers will show a stiffer spine?

Slim to none.

This critic can’t directly weigh in about the current, sorry state of movie going. Press screenings either feature hardcore movie fans or fellow critics. Both groups are far less likely to be rowdy in the theater, and if they are they’ll be swiftly shushed into silence.

That’s likely not happening in theaters nationwide. Would you risk it?

We can fort up in our homes and avoid the nyekulturny at the theater. We can agree among ourselves to interact with each other at the bar or restaurant, and turn the electronic shackles off.

Unfortunately, we're going to have to turf the soft-on-crime politicians out of our local governments, and trust the residents of the cities people are fleeing thanks to the crime to figure it out.