SCP-215: Paranoia-Inducing Spectacles

SCP-215: Paranoia-Inducing Spectacles SCP-215 is a pair of prescription glasses that gradually convinces the wearer that objects have personalities and can communicate. At first, that might look like someone joking about an uncooperative computer. With continued use, the relationships become more elaborate, more important, and eventually frightening enough to overwhelm the person's life. There is no dependable safe period of wear. Symptoms generally take at least a day to develop, but some people experience them much sooner. Taking the glasses off does not immediately undo the effects. Therapy can help in less severe cases, although putting the glasses back on can rapidly reverse that progress. The detailed case study follows a man whose own glasses are deliberately destroyed by Foundation staff. He is given SCP-215 as a replacement while working as a research assistant. The new prescription initially causes headaches and blurred vision. Within a few days, he has named the glasses Steve and started describing their relationship. His attention then spreads to the equipment around him. The computer, coffee machine, refrigerator, microwave, and handheld device all acquire personalities. He does not claim to hear actual voices. He says he understands their body language. A machine failing to work becomes an unfriendly act by something he believes has made a choice. By the second week, office supplies have personalities too. He spends less time with people and more time talking to objects. Psychologists find that he has built a complicated set of relationships around them. By this stage, wearers commonly resist attempts to take the glasses away. One incident captures how far it has gone. After a microwave fails to heat his food properly, he tries to destroy it with a chair. Later, he apologizes to both the microwave and the chair. Soon he is thanking individual floor tiles for letting him walk on them. Almost every ordinary action now involves negotiating with something he believes can take offense. The relationships become increasingly hostile. He destroys possessions in what he considers self-defense and panics at a computer that is not even switched on. Eventually, staff find him dead after an apparent attempt to disable an electrical outlet. The danger he believes surrounds him has driven him into a real physical danger. The final note addresses the obvious possibility that the glasses might let him perceive living machines. Dr. Naamdi says his tests have found no evidence of that. As far as the research establishes, the objects remain ordinary and the changes occur in the wearer's perceptions. That distinction gives this entry its force. The Foundation does not need to contain an army of angry appliances. It needs to recognize what the glasses are doing to a person and stop the exposure. In the case study, it watches the progression for weeks instead. The glasses are classified Safe because they can be left in their case, while the person wearing them steadily loses the ability to feel safe anywhere. Original Entry: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-215