I ask Jack why we don’t watch Joey, expecting him to say spin-offs are lovers staying friends once they’re done, like making stew out of yesterday’s meat. Instead he says, “Joey won’t feel shame for anything, sees no consequence to sleeping with women then not calling them. He lacks etiquette, isn’t gentlemanly about it, with anything he does, and I can’t stand that shit any longer.”
And that’s a feeling I get – it’s one I’m akin to. Some instincts kick in – altruism, apparently, according to Jack, although it’s hard to believe that – and others are learned. Mine, from church, is a strappado of sorts, sputters up when it should or shouldn’t which is relative depending who you talk to. And I know dishonour, disgrace, are just a way to maintain a sense of restaint against offending others, but my shame’s public, built around beads like rubbing plastic, praying on it, can solve the things we do we don’t want to do, but don’t know why we don’t think we should do them. I don’t get it until Fassbender does. And even then I’m skirting schools of thought. And Joey Tribbiani, in reality, you would run from.