This morning I listened to an episode of Radio Lab called “The Living Room.” The funny thing is I wasn’t even planning on listening to that. I was getting ready to listen to the latest episode of Reply All but my podcast player auto played this episode instead. I think it was the Irish voice at the beginning, announcing a sponsor, that got me sucked in.
After the show was over I felt like I needed a “book club” to process what I had just listened to.
Spoiler alert. The show is about a New York City woman who watches another couple through their unblocked bedroom window. She sees them having sex and over time watches the young man come down will a serious illness and die.
Wow! What do you do with a topic like that? Does listening to a show about a voyeur inadvertently make me an unwilling voyeur myself?
I had so many questions running through my mind after listening to this. But then I thought, what if I had a group of people together discussing questions about the episode? The differences in opinions would be enlightening. Perhaps it could help us understand our own humanity here in 2015.
So with that in mind, a group of people sitting around and discussing this, here are the questions I would like to ask. (You should probably listen to the show before reading the questions.)
Is a show about voyeurism even interesting?
Why is a show about voyeurism interesting?
Are people in a city entitled to privacy if they choose not to be private?
Are people in a major international city not aware that strangers are watching them all the time?
How did the husband feel about his wife’s obsession?
Was the husband obsessed as well?
Did the wife tell anyone else about her voyeuristic obsession besides her husband?
Is getting a pair of binoculars crossing the line into invasion of privacy?
Is invasion of privacy even possible if people refuse to get curtains and keep their actions private?
What happened in the relationship of the husband and wife after the discovery and continued watching of the other couple having sex (ie. did it create friction, closeness, embarrassment or something else)?
Would the wife have reacted differently about the seeing the progression toward death if she had not been obsessively watching their intimate moments first?
Which is more emotionally powerful, sex or death? What’s the difference?
Was the wife entitled to feel so emotionally connected to the young couple?
Did the wife really mourn the young man or was she just feeling an emotional aftermath similar to watching a powerful movie drama?
Is there a difference between real life emotions and emotions resulting from voyeurism?
What is it about death that draws us into someone else’s life?
If we feel such powerful emotions, especially about strangers, what do we do with those?
Is it selfish and unfair to family and friends in our lives to be impacted so strongly by emotions stemming from people we don’t even know?
If you were in the wife’s position would you have done the same thing?
If you were the wife and bumped into the young woman at a store would you say anything to her? Why or why not?
How would the young woman react to finding out that someone had been watching her life?
Is it creepy to watch someone in a city or is it just city life?
What are the chances that someone listening to the podcast would make the connection about who the young woman is and would tell her?
Why would the wife admit to this story and share it publicly? What is the purpose of that?
Does the wife feel a sense of guilt that is absolved by sharing the story?
What does this story reveal about humanity and our feelings about sex and death?
What does this story reveal about our sense of community?