Sorry, but it’s time for me to dust off my soapbox and drag it out of storage. To paraphrase Dennis Miller, I’m about go off on a rant here.
The question of whether or not movie theatres could survive the COVID-19 pandemic has dominated a lot of Nerd discussions the last year and a half. When movie theatres across the globe went dark, movie studios wasted little time trying to to adapt and began experimenting with new distribution models. Streaming, viewer on demand and renting through cable all became overnight sensations with varying degrees of success.
But now that theatres are slowly opening up again and movies are trickling back (Paramount is taking a huge gamble at the end of this month by releasing A Quiet Place 2 strictly to theatres), the question has become what they’ll look like on the other side of this crisis. How many people will consider them safe? How long will it take for things to return to “normal?”
But a toxic cloud of elitist disrespect has risen amid all these these conversations, casting a disgusting shadow and revealing a lot of people’s true colours. And as usual, social media is soaked in oceans of this venom.
First, let’s address the health concerns. I’ve lost count of all the people I’ve seen publicly refusing to step another foot in a movie theatre post pandemic because “they just don’t feel safe.” Then in the very next sentence they’ll announce how they just simply can’t wait for their next trip to the Caribbean or Cuba or some other wonderful tropical destination you can only get to by plane.
Let me break that down. Despite the increasing distribution of vaccines, you can bet theatre chains will definitely observe stringent health protocols. Customers can expect seats spaced to promote social distancing so no one will be sitting beside them that outside of friends or family. No one will be sitting directly in front of or behind them either. Theatres will be cleaned top to bottom in between screenings and both staff and customers alike will be required to wear masks (when they’re not loudly eating concessions, that is). But the nervous nellies still insist that movie theatres aren’t safe enough.
OK, fair enough. But these very same pearl-clutchers express absolutely zero hesitation about boarding a crowded plane, shoulder to shoulder with two hundred strangers, sitting in a pressurized cabin for nine or more hours breathing recycled air and hoping that everyone keeps their masks (and shoes) on. At least movie theatres make an attempt to ensure safety (when they’re been open anyway). But commercial airlines have been packing their planes to the bursting brim since the beginning of this nightmare. Let’s not forget that airplanes were the world’s worst Coronavirus super spreader, casually transporting hundreds of thousands of sick and infected people across the globe in the weeks leading up to global quarantines.
(The second biggest spreader? Cruise ships. Your welcome.)
Dozens of new videos show up every day on YouTube showing people being dragged kicking and screaming off a flight pre-takeoff because they refuse to wear a mask or obey health precautions. At least disgruntled and selfish anti-maskers can be escorted out of a movie theatre by ushers or, if needs be, police. What do they do with people who just decide they’re going to stop wearing their mask at 30,000 feet over the Atlantic? Ask them to leave?
Don’t get the wrong idea, I’m not saying no one should travel when this is all said and done. And I’m definitely not trying to make any one afraid of traveling. I’m just pointing out the ludicrous hypocrisy of those who are too afraid to set a single toe in a movie theatre but will be first in line to board a fourteen hour transatlantic flight. I’ve seen close to zero hesitation over international travel yet a completely irrational, borderline superstitious collective phobia of going to see a movie (even post vaccination). I’d like to say this is the last thing I’ll say on the topic, but the truth is I plan on smacking people in the face with their hypocrisy every time it comes up.
Now that that’s off my chest, let’s move on the main attraction.
I usually make a habit of NOT interacting with people on social media. Sure, I share plenty some cute animal videos, I’ve recycled my fair share of jokes (most of them bad) and I’ve even shared a poignant thought or two on the very rare occasion I have them. But I’ve learned that interacting with people on social media is usually more headaches than its worth. But lately I’ve tried pointing out to people that are actually hoping movie theatres go out of business that it would throw a lot of people out of work. And in response I’ve been piled on and buried under a tonne of elitist garbage masquerading as “progressive” thinking.
Take one of my most recent Twitter bouts as an exxample. I commented on a thread about the box office fallout of studios simultaneously releasing blockbusters in both theatres and streaming. I was actually agreeing with another poster who expressed sympathy for the people who could lose jobs as a result. Before I knew it I was getting a lecture on business ethics and the irrelevance of people in low paying jobs.
The most passionate responder posted a list of movie theatre salaries he had Googled and said that the jobs didn’t pay enough to care about. He literally said that if they paid more he might be inclined to fight for them but because they didn’t he could care less about both the jobs and the people in them. When I responded that I fully agreed they were underpaid and that the minimum wage should be raised in a lot of places, but the only thing worse than having a low paying job during a pandemic inspired recession was not having a job at, well suffice to say I had to look up some of the names I got called. And not just by him. His “low paying jobs and the people in them aren’t worth my time” argument garnered a lot of support online.
I wish I could say that was an aberration. But it isn’t.
When California’s Arclight and Pacific Theatre Chain was recently forced to shutter its doors permanently, there were plenty of tears. But there was also a lot of shoulder shrugging and no shortage of cheering online. The most common reason for celebration among the cheerleaders was that the pandemic had given the Hollywood “elite” a bloody nose. No thought spared for the people thrown out of work during a global recession.
Last spring when it looked like AMC, the largest movie chain in the United States (employing over 22,000 people) may also be forced to throw in the towel, the first and most liked comment on one message board was someone clapping their hands in glee that “celebrities would finally get put in their place.” Not a word about those 22,000 people staring unemployment in the face.
North America’s five largest theatre chains (including AMC) employ around 80,000 people, give or take. But if those theatre chains closed today, those 80,000 souls wouldn’t be the only ones affected. Imagine what a blow losing all those theatres would be to the companies selling them concessions; companies who need to sell massive amounts of product to said theatres to keep their own doors open and they own employees collecting a paycheque. After all, with no theatres to sell candy and soda and popcorn, you’d need fewer people to load delivery trucks and fewer people to drive them.
Thousands of theatres would no longer need to employ local companies and contractors for yearly upkeep (when I worked for a roofing company, annual building repair and maintenance was the only thing that got them through the lean years-if theatres disappeared tomorrow, think of all those roofs that would no longer need to be patched every spring). Speaking of real estate, think of all the millions of dollars in rent no longer being paid to brick and mortar malls already struggling to survive.
When Cineworld re-closed all of its theatres last fall, it was estimated that the move impacted eight to ten thousand people above and beyond it’s thirty-seven plus thousand employees. If movie theatres became extinct, the number of people directly impacted would easily be in the six digit range. That’s a small city.
And a lot of people either don’t seem to care or are actually hoping it happens.
(While we’re on the subject, let’s just retire the “I don’t care if the movie industry hurts because I hate celerities and they’re all overpaid” argument, shall we? Sure, marquee talent and executives may eventually feel the economic turbulence of business loss, but you know who will feel it first? Regular people. The movie and television industry employ millions of people who make their livings performing stunts, building sets, designing costumes, operating cameras, performing electrical work, catering shoots and providing countless other services. None of them make millions of dollars and none of them are responsible for the reasons a lot of people hate-and hate is the right word-celebrities. But they will be the first ones to feel the pain. So anyone who still clings to the “I don’t care because I hate movie stars” argument needs to yank their ignorant heads out of their ignorant asses.)
The COIVD-19 pandemic has revealed a lot of ugly truths about both our society and ourselves. Truths we’re probably going to spend years trying to forget instead of learning from. One of those truths is something we’ve long known but has become painfully evident; people working low wage service jobs are not just looked down on, they’re openly despised.
For it’s entire life, the consuming public has been told “the customer is always right.” As a result it actively looks down at the people on the other side of the cash register or serving the food or filling the shelves or cleaning the floors. It looks at the people wearing the name tags and the smocks and the company uniforms as less than human. Undeserving of anything resembling respect or dignity.
It’s the real reason why half the world loses its mind whenever you talk about raising the minimum wage. It isn’t because they’re afraid of the effect on business (are you sure super multibillionaire Jeff Bezos can’t afford to pay Amazon workers an extra dollar an hour?) or raise the cost of living (the usual go-to excuse). It’s because they don’t think people who work in minimum wage jobs are worth it.
So the time has come for people to both shove their cowardly hypocrisy where the sun doesn’t (or shouldn’t) shine and to stop cowering behind excuses about why they look down on people who work in theatres (or any other part of the movie making industry). Either start respecting them or admit that your a condescending, narcissistic ass who only cares about people in jobs you deem worthy.
Because quite frankly the world can’t afford your fragile delusions anymore. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to put my soap box away.
Image via www.victoriabuzz.com
