Reality TV (protest song)

 

The ‘Green Guide’ told us to watch the TV

It claimed that we would finally see reality.

Under the impression that truth is not a digression

I had to ask the question

As to why the strange things I saw that night

Were advertised as real and right

So I waited for the commercial break

To lose my concentration

As my attention wandered away

From the packet filled with cornflakes on the screen

To reality as it has been

From the cornflakes on the screen

To reality as it has been

 

So I looked out of my window

And saw that things were good –

The tree that I had planted

Was still standing where it should;

I thought it seemed real enough

I didn’t need to check

I saw a purple flower

But in the shade it looked black.

 

Then I looked up at the sky

Where the moon had been last night

The moon had gone and in its place

Was a glowing ball of light

A glowing ball of light

 

“Could this be real?” I wondered

As I looked on with delight

As the cotton clouds changed shape

To form a white dove bird in flight

But I knew that it was only a cloud I knew it was the sky

I didn’t wave my arms about

Thinking that I could fly!

 

I didn’t watch the box that night

To tell me what is wrong and what is right

But ‘reality’ blazed its bizarre beams

Into other minds and other brains

And I wonder how many were sane

With ‘reality TV’ in their brains

I wonder how many were sane

With ‘reality TV’ in their brains.

 

(words and music by Romesh Senewiratne-Alagaratnam, copyright 2004)