Actor turned political activist Laurence Fox is in trouble again.

He enjoyed a lunch with friends, gave them hugs, then boasted about it on Twitter.

Here is the shocking proof:

In a decade or so’s time, when historians look back on the madness of 2020, they are going to examine tweets like this in a state of utter disbelief.

“Can it really be that in 2020 the very act of having lunch with a bunch of people, talking to them and hugging them was considered to be something dangerously reactionary and irresponsible?” they’ll ask.

And for confirmation, they’ll only have to look at some of the responses.

Here’s a snitch called Darryl — one of several — who wants to report Fox to the police and land him a £10,000 fine.

And here are a few more examples of the furious comments Fox received.

Get fucked, you desperate, deranged, narcissistic gusset stain. I hope your sprouts get overcooked to mush and that the copy of The Wicker Man you put on your Christmas list turns out to be the Nicolas Cage remake.

Dear oh dear, I can’t quite believe the sheer nerve of this. I am an actor, currently working within the NHS on a Covid contract to keep the wolf from the door until our industry recovers. Just can’t quite believe the brazen lack of respect for what is right.

And when one of that group falls ill and they and their family suffers as have people I have known, remember your freedom. Lets hope it’s not when you are on a ventilator. Exceptionalism is not a vaccine Laurence.

I know people who’ve died, people I loved. I’m currently Covid positive, it’s real, it’s awful. Messages like this, some people will listen and relax their guard. You could kill people. One of the people you hugged, you could have killed them. It’s bleak, but true. THINK.

Wasn’t going to get involved with the Laurence Fox stuff, but now he’s bragging about putting my family at risk, I figure why not. I was once up against him for a US TV role – to play the son of James Fox’s character. As in, Laurence’s actual dad. I got it.

There are many more in this vein. What they reveal, I fear, is that Britain is even more bitterly divided than ever it was during Brexit: between those who believe that Covid-19 is a deadly threat which could easily kill off their nearest and dearest and those, like Fox, who believe that it has been horribly overblown by government propaganda and that the time has come for us all to get on with our lives, reclaim our freedoms and get the economy back up and running.

The two positions are so intractably opposed that it’s hard to see how they can easily be resolved, especially when there’s so much righteous indignation on both sides.

But let’s take a step back for a moment. In what kind of sane universe would it be possible for a man to attract so much rage, so much bitter hatred merely for the crime of enjoying a lunch with friends.

Before 2020 it would have been literally inconceivable that anyone could consider the act of having lunch with friends anything but a healthy, happy, and perhaps above all, unexceptionable activity. It wouldn’t have been a problem at the height of either of the two World Wars. It wouldn’t even have been considered a problem during the Bubonic Plague.

I’d say all those angry hotheads bloviating against Laurence Fox need to look in the mirror and ask themselves: “What have I become?”

And Boris Johnson’s administration needs to look at itself too and ask: “What kind of monster have I created?”