Hygiene Theater
Hygienic tactics performed to make people feel safer
Example
As more people get fully vaccinated I hope we can finally do away with all this hygiene theater
Some people get carried away with hygiene theater
Related Slang
| Security theater | Security measures that don't actually increase security |
| rona | Coronavirus |
| Covidiot | A person who downplays the dangers of COVID-19 |
| PPE | Personal Protective Equipment |
| Scamdemic | Fake pandemic |
| Social distancing | Isolating from other people |
| Blursday | Literally any day of the week, they're all the same now |
| Quaranteam | A small group that socializes in-person during COVID-19 |
| Doom-scrolling | Scrolling to find bad news |
| Corona bump | Elbow bump with a person to avoid spreading the coronavirus |
| vax | Vaccination |
| Vaxhole | A person who brags about being vaccinated |
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Hygiene theater is when people and businesses enact measures to make people who are anxious about the spread of germs feel safer but do little to actually prevent spreading. This performative act became prominent in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Where did hygiene theater come from?
Atlantic writer Derek Thompson is credited with coining "hygiene theater" when he documented ineffective covid tactics in July 2020. The name comes from the intention of deploying safety measures that are more "for show," like a play in a theater, than to actually be effective.
Hygiene theater tactics may come from sincere attempts at curbing the spread of covid that have been proven unhelpful. However, they are most often disingenuous attempts to make potential customers who are anxious feel safe to shop in-store again.
Examples of hygiene theater
Hygiene theater may appear as various cautionary practices, such as temperature checks at building entrances, QR codes for digital menus in restaurants, touchless condiment dispensers, or deep cleaning of surfaces in homes and businesses. While these measures have proven to be ineffective, they are still heavily employed.