Again, it comes down to behaviors we used to rely on but just can't expect anymore - propriety, civility, common sense. I tend to think that most people still understand that at an event such as theatre, we as audience are the guests, those onstage "have the floor." We, as audience are encouraged to respond to what we are seeing with applause, laughter, etc, and to simply enjoy the performance (or sometimes not) - but we are not there to push an agenda or to claim we can do anything we want under the guise of free speech.
People don't innocently bring in such huge flags without knowing they're going to be challenging the room with them. I suspect very few people wouldn't realize they re going to create controversy by doing so. The fact that they're so willing to break the basic common sense civility and decorum of an artistic event such as this, claiming "free speech" is just ridiculous, and I think that down inside they know that - but they just don't care.
To reverse things - if this were, say, a school performance, and Mr. Flag Bearer's young daughter was onstage, and someone held up a huge sign (of any sort) up by her during the show (or bows) and she grabbed it away, in the spirit of "don't disrupt the performance, ever" - he would have been the most proud dad in the world. And he knows that. |
