Minority Report

He worked for a newspaper.

He was working from home because he had been beaten up, having left the paper shop without a copy of The Sun, The Mail or The Express.

The gang beat him and kicked him, cracking some ribs and calling him a "woke bastard" and "woke twat".

He reported it to the police but they told him that it was his own fault. Why hadn't he bought a real newspaper? Those young lads were just upholding the country's core values, and letting him know where he stood.

Now he was behind his front door. That used to give you security from the world outside but no longer.

It had come gradually

The government introduced laws for "security" to protect people. One thing that was continually emphasised was that if you had done nothing wrong then you did not have to worry. The problem was more and more things were being classed as "wrong", like the fact that he didn't buy a designated red top paper.

People were encouraged to snoop on their neighbours and report them for anything that was seen as a misdemeanour, and being reported was a black mark against you whether there was any substance in the accusation or not. After all, there was no smoke without fire was there?

His work was getting continually rejected by his newspaper if it contained anything that was not complimentary about the government, and criticism was out of the question.

Because everything he wrote was transmitted via networks, he could not even send anything saying what he really thought to similarly-minded friends.

They all knew this. Encrypted communications were punishable by a life sentence in one of the government work camps. These also housed refugees and the poor, being poor was also now deemed a crime. People should always look to better themselves by getting a better job or working multiple poorly paid ones and that was the only option for most people trying to stay out of the camps. They called them work camps but they were just prisons based on the workhouse principle.

He and some friends started to meet covertly on long walks away from surveillance cameras although there was always the risk of being spotted by surveillance drones.

They met under trees and in derelict barns, where they would talk about how they could survive and find a way to do something about the government. At first, they produced a small printed ideas sheet, which they christened "The Minority Report" because there was only a minority of people who would take the risk to even read it, but they then decided that was too much of a risk because anyone caught with a copy would be immediately sent to the work camp.

So these meets were the only way to spread and distribute ideas but even these were now coming under threat. The last few times people had to return home because they were being followed by survey drones. The drones were always in groups so even if you could shoot one down (an impossibility because the government controlled all weaponry) the other drones would record you, and possession of an illegal gun was a one-way trip to the work camp.

So here he was at home, his latest article had been rejected because it was "too long" and readers needed articles of less than a hundred words that contained what they needed to know.

Then there was an email telling him he was sacked because his work was not of the required standard. He didn't know what to think.

There was a knock on the door.

He opened it and there were three uniformed men there wearing badges for work camp security.

"Come with us, you have been found guilty" ................