"Dont leave the safety of the subway!!"

I generally like Madrid's subway system, or "el Metro" as we call it here. There are some things that irritate me about it though, like its incessant expansion and repairs that seem to plague it of late. But there is one thing that goes farther than irritating me and that is the Metro televisions. I dont trust them. I never have. 5 years ago, they started installing flat screen tvs in all the major subway stations around the city; slowly they added them to the smaller ones as well. Now, it may be because of the undercurrent of paranoia that seems to flow through my subconcious, but the first thing that I thought when I saw the everpresent screens was the brainwashing potential of the metro television. Think about it, at any given time there are probably over 500,000 people watching the same channel, a channel they cannot switch or turn off. It used to not have any sound to it, merely with subtitles, but now they have speakers as well so you cannot simply turn away. The screen is always there, telling you useless information in the forms of advertising and "public interest" news stories.
I remember when I first started telling people of my distrust for the everpresent medium. My friends looked at me like if I were crazy, when I mentioned the potential that the Metro TV had for being a medium for mass control. I was so sure of my theory that for a while I refused to watch the screens. After a while I gave up on my refusal to watch the flickering squares that illuminated the train tracks, either proving their ultimate power to draw you in or proving my lack of real willpower and conviction. However, lately I have realized that I was closer to the truth than we realized at the time though the form or brainwashing has turned out to be a little less subtle than I though. I overestimated the media savvyness of the masses back when I first formed my theory, thinking that the government or metro directors could use subliminal messages to subjugate the people. However, the messages are turning out to be quite blatant. I have noticed an increasing number of "news stories" on the metro television that talk about the dangers of driving. Last week it was the increasing traffic, global warming because of car exhaust, and a bus accident. This week it is the dangers of motorcycles and using car gps systems. If that isnt a shameless method of self promotion for the subway company I dont know what is. I knew I was right about them. Big brother is watching you, and he wants you on a subway.