Who's Watching Who?

Grant Bartley tells a terrifying tale of privacy, paranoia and popular culture.

- Grant Bartley

Phil and Sarah are in their small living room, slumped on their once-cream beige sofa, watching rolling news clips. Sarah glances around and thinks, ‘How can I feel so bored and let-down already? Talk about being ground down by disappointment through failed expectations. Except we don’t talk about it.’ She says, “So how can we remake our lives, Phil?”

“I dunno. To start, maybe think up something nice to do.” He purses his lips.

“No!” She hits his arm with a cushion. “I mean, how can we really make things better for ourselves, rather than pursue luxuries that we can’t afford anyway?” She gestures vaguely at the screen as a Jaguar advert flashes up.

Phil mumbles his usual reply: “By turning this off, for a start. By looking at the world. Unfortunately, reality doesn’t have the cachet of the screen world. Reality can’t compete with the glamour and wealth we yearn for.”

“What do we do, then? Not just us, I mean Society?” “Give everybody food and shelter and education and entertainment, would be my personal preference. That’s what I’d do. I can’t see it happening though. So my question is, What is to the ultimate benefit of the human race? By which I mean, well, me, primarily – but everyone else too,” he added, generously.