If the last four years of national politics have proven anything, it’s that shame is a pretty shitty motivator. Externally applied shame, anyway, which has so far proven unable to convince vast swathes of the American population to give up everything from their racist beliefs, to their assault rifles, to their god-given rights to spread whatever viruses they want, when and wherever they’d like. Still, though: There’s shame, and then there’s Tom Hanks Shame. It’s worth a shot, at least
Said force of “dad’s mad” disapproval has now been applied to everybody refusing to wear a mask during the COVID-19 pandemic, with People reporting that former-COVID-haver Tom Hanks is extremely peeved—bordering on miffed—over the refusal to take what is, by every account, the barest fucking minimum possible actions to curtail the spread of the disease. “There’s really only three things we can do in order to get to tomorrow,” Hanks said recently, while promoting his new Apple submarine movie Greyhound. “Wear a mask, social distance, wash our hands. Those things are so simple, so easy, if anybody cannot find it in themselves to practice those three very basic things—I just think shame on you.” Working himself up to a for-Tom-Hanks-fever-pitch later, Hanks went on to deploy a word so bad that People wouldn’t even print it. (We’re pretty sure it’s “prick,” although we’d also accept “person with no sense of shame or the public good.”). “Don’t be a p——, get on with it, do your part. It’s very basic. If you’re driving a car, you don’t go too fast, you use your turn signal and you avoid hitting pedestrians.” Hanks then finished with the same sort of mutter your parents might issue at hearing about all the damn fool things you get up to with all your other Patient Zeroes, rubbing your faces on each other and coughing on the nice Trader Joe’s people.: “My Lord, it’s common sense.”