Forget spying on cell phone activity.  The government’s had this one in the works for quite some time now.  It’s brilliant, really.  Get over half the damn nation to put one of these f*ckers in their homes, thereby planting the bug themselves.

GENIUS, I TELL YOU!

It’s possible I’ve read too many dystopian novels (that’s totally not it, though), but I think the Elf on the Shelf is just another government ploy to keep watch over the sheeple.  Kind of like Taylor Swift, you know?

Think about it.  They convince us all we need one of these creeptastic creations as a sort of family tradition or some crap.  “Tell ’em…insane laughter…tell ’em the elf’s watching over the children when really…audible muahaha…it’s really us keeping tabs on the adults!” snorted the guy in the CIA (or whatever government agency is responsible for voyeurism) who came up with this ingenious idea.

Still skeptical?

OK, then.  What about all the inappropriate Elf on the Shelf imagery flooding the internet?  Excellent way for The Man to keep tabs on the well-hidden sociopaths, sex predators, and wayward nonconformists (such as yours truly…wayward nonconformist here, not sociopath or sex predator, that is).

Or how about all those rule followers who bend over backwards moving the elf around the house each night?  SO THE GOVERNMENT CAN SPY FROM MULTIPLE VANTAGE POINTS.  Yeah.  Starting to make sense, isn’t it?

And don’t for one minute think these things are under your control.  YOU ARE UNDER THEIR CONTROL.  (I can almost see your heads exploding this very instant.) Oh, and don’t worry. It’s just Big Brother replacing the batteries is all.

The anal probing doesn’t begin until closer to Christmastime.