The Surveyor Surveilled
(just like L’Arroseur Arrosé – The Waterer Watered or The Sprinkler Sprinkled – 1897)

Is a perfect example of the notion of how surveillance can affect both the subject and the witness. After witnessing a crime, a life, or destruction the witness of the surveillance, whether they are an innocent bystander or a perpetrator, as in the case of Ales Rivera’s Sleep Dealers, they are mutually impacted and affected, much like in the situations of the gaoler and the prisoner.

In the three examples we have, Alex Rivera’s Sleep Dealers, Hitchcock’s Rear Window and Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s The Lives of Others, the perpetrator, the witness, or the spy are affected in different ways that range from remorse for having caused destruction and pain, as in Sleep Dealers, to satisfaction of having fulfilled a citizen’s duty, which pushed to the extreme, may manifest itself as an infringement on people’s privacy and lives, of which suddenly the witness becomes an integral part, as in the case of von Donnersmarck’s The Lives of Others.

Surveillance is not an innocent act. Although sometimes necessary, as in the case of the CCTV footage that is nowadays at the disposal of police and detectives to solve crimes, or the body cams that police wear, checking their behaviour in critical situations, surveillance, when used in an unethical manner may present a serious problem infringing on the rights of people.

With the use of cell phones and personal cameras no one is safe from surveillance at any given moment in their lives. When you walk down the street, you can never be sure that no one is secretly filming you from a ‘read window’, even though the use of this footage and how it is shared is what may present the threat and not the footage in itself. With the democratization of access to spy cameras, namely cell phones, everyone can spy on everyone else. We do not have any privacy any more, and social media comes to compound this. Our lives are public and will be that way for as long as we live. With the Coronavirus situation, this has become even more pronounced, as the cameras, without permission, have entered our homes, and now our interiors are also public.
Unfortunately there is no going back.

I watched a very interesting documentary on PBS about the animal kingdom, and in it, animals were filmed in their environment in situations that were never before seen. This was made possible through drones disguised as animals and introduced into the very group they were trying to film. Such as a stuffed mechanical bear one eye of which is a hidden camera, or a seagull, flying with the flock of birds that in reality is a drone spy bird. This was fascinating, and a first of its kind. The drone spy animals were made to look just like the real ones, and blended into the herd or flock in a very inconspicuous way and filmed moments and situations that would not have been possible to film had it been for a human operated camera or even a drone that looked like one.
This made me think that the animals had no say in the matter and were completely unaware of what was happening and how their social circle was being invaded in a way never done before. They could not even defend themselves against this, because they could not tell who the spy was. On a few occasions they would approach, smell, handle, and at best leave alone the spy animal.
It is also believed that computer cameras are two ways. Some people, I have seen put a post on their computer cameras, I am not sure how true this is or not, but I would not rule out the possibility, especially now, in the age of COVID-19 confinement.
How it will affect the behaviour of the witness or the surveillor is another matter and it will probably be clearer with the passage of time.