THE
WATCHERS
by David L. Jaffe
Beware! They walk among us, strangers who wear the guise of normalcy,
yet they are preparing to incite fear and tension and to produce havoc
and dissension. They would callously and single mindedly pursue these
ends for their own selfish and depraved reasons. And they would have us
sit idly by while it happens, passively colluding with them, while each
week brings a new installment of their terrible plan. Beware, for there
are guerrillas in our midst.
Who are these people? What organization do they belong to? Al-Qa'ida? HAMAS? PLO? IRA? KGB? IRS? Do you know? Can you guess?
The answer is none of the above. The offending organization is NBC. And CBS. And ABC. And, oh yeah, FOX. For it is not terrorists I speak of but network executives, who create and promote so-called reality television programs such as Survivor, Fear Factor, Big Brother, The Mole, and Temptation Island -- shows that are all show and that seek to entertain by shamelessly appealing to the basest and most voyeuristic tendencies of the viewing (and product-consuming) public. It's Jerry Springer and Sally Jessy Raphael taken to the next level and guised as drama.
It's the Roman Empire redux. However, instead of the emperor Titus Flavius Vespasianus, we have the executive that is a Humongous Gluteus Maximus. Instead of the plotting and backstabbing of Brutus and Cassius, we have the plotting and backstabbing of Regular Joe and Regular Joan as they seek to outlast one another and avoid being voted off some remote island. Instead of throwing gladiators to the lions, we turn "contestants" into circus animals -- isolating them, provoking them, devising torturous physical challenges for them, intruding on their privacy, turning them against one another. And for what do these contemporary gladiators compete? Not life and limb but fame and fortune...or, at least, the remote possibility of such. The shows appeal largely to the participants' avarice and narcissism, and somehow we are supposed to get a vicarious thrill out of it. But the more we watch, the more we get desensitized to the spectacle of it all. And the more our demand for such dreck grows. It just doesn't seem right to me. It's a moral limbo. How low can we go?
Speaking of which, I wonder when the risk for terrorist attacks will be low. At the time of this writing, according to The Office of Homeland Security, a unit of The White House and a subsidiary of ExxonMobil, the "current nationwide threat level" is "ELEVATED." That's a yellow alert, using the handy-dandy Homeland Security Advisory System. Now, determining the Threat Condition, which used to involve cautiously peering out one's doorway to see if any terrorists were lurking about or if any tall landmarks were in flames, is as simple as logging on to www.whitehouse.gov/homeland. Whew! I know I'm relieved.
Actually, I'm not relieved. I'm a tad anxious. In fact, I'm quite worried. Given that our elected and appointed guardians in the District of Columbia (not to be confused with the country of Colombia, which has a slightly different spelling and a slightly lower crime rate) have suggested that domestic terrorist attacks are not a matter of 'if' but 'when,' I feel that it is in my best interests to be on the highest state of alert. And so I am, big time. I'm on such high alert that my sphincter could now double as a nutcracker, which might be great for shelling pecans but does little for maintaining regularity. The hard drive on my computer should be this backed up.
Regardless, I remain vigilant for any and all questionable activity. Right now, I suspect that my neighbor is stockpiling explosives. I came by my suspicions the other evening when I happened to be standing in the bushes (rose and hydrangea, not George and Laura) and peering through his window. Don't worry, I wasn¹t invading his privacy. I was conducting surveillance. I'm told there's a difference. And even though Timmy's only 10 years old and those explosives are only firecrackers, I believe that he is planning to ignite them and then drop them down the storm drain, thus laying waste to our waste. This is just the sort of sewer-side bombing that the government warned us about!
Okay, I embellish a bit. And pun shamelessly. So sue me. (You know that there's a lawyer who will.) All this alertness is getting to me. What started out as watchfulness has degraded into intrusiveness, even voyeurism. The slide down that slippery slope has been made easier by a popular culture that has myopically blurred the boundaries between public and private, and by certain conservative elements within the federal government who see no problem with such ends, though they may weakly object to the means. (No way is John Ashcroft going to admit that he watches Big Brother. Not when he is Big Brother.) Not surprisingly, the Feds are desperate for intelligence. They want to spy on us and want us to spy on one another. It's voyeurism as public policy. It's Uncle Sam exploiting the public's post-9/11 fear factor. Privacy is sacrificed in the supposed interest of national security. How else do you explain Operation TIPS? Or the USA Patriot Act? Or the broadening of the Neighborhood Watch Program? Or the increased use of video cameras in public places? Or our own desensitization and acquiescence to such actions?
So as I stand in my neighbor's bushes, watching for suspicious activity, fighting off mosquitoes and anxiety, trying to recall if I set the VCR to tape tonight's celebrity Fear Factor, and hoping not to be spied spying and alarm anyone, I begin to ask myself another question. Who is the terrorist, now?
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David L. Jaffe is a clinical social worker actively working for change in Western Massachusetts. He lives with his pet dust bunnies, Gore and Lieberman, and wants to know who is watching the watchers.
copyright © 2002 David L. Jaffe. All rights reserved.