The Way We Watch Each Other Now | Vanity Fair

How has our ability to closely—and routinely—film each other altered the social contract?

Save this story Save this story Lately, whenever I have to wait out one of life’s everyday interstitial moments, say, on the subway, I try to keep myself from looking at my phone by looking at what other people are looking at on their phones instead. Mostly, it’s pleasingly banal—text messages, memes, Zillow listings, the not-occasional selfie getting pinched and zoomed as part of some inner moment of self-interrogation. I’m aware that I’m intruding. These days, the phone is equal parts tether and mirror, and observing another person prodding at their little screen is like catching them in a p

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