Spoilers for episode 6 of season 3 of Black Mirror below.
Civilian casualties are as common as they are condemned. Numbers remind us that governments, be it democratic or authoritarian, kill large numbers of civilians as a military strategy.
In his lecture, Thomas Gregory discussed the principle of noncombatant immunity. While it may be strong, the fact that civilian casualties occur so often show that in the hearts and minds of our leaders, perception is what matters, not principle.
Governments go a long way for this perception. The United States, for example, is using and consistently developing what scholar Eric Bonds describes as “hyper-rationalized violence.” This encompasses everything from precision weaponry, technical and administrative procedures to limit civilian deaths, and calculations to achieve ‘proportionality’ goals. Crucially, most of this involves high-level technology.
And so, the act of murder seems to transform, as technology progresses, into a cleaner, more sophisticated business. This, however, hardly means fewer civilian deaths. The attack on Soleimani, for one, resulted in far more casualties than the direct targets. For drones, this is a relatively small-scale blunder.
As Bonds exposes, while drone wars have been celebrated as ‘the most precise… in history’, their bombs have unintentionally killed thousands of unarmed civilians and contributed to utter devastation.
But a drone is unlike any other weapon of war. As a piece of technology, it is accessible to all. Despite the significant security controls on drones, cybersecurity consultants have warned that equipment is already available to hack drones so they can bypass security controls. Technology is a democratizing beast, and it walks hand-in-hand with corruption. If there is a will to hack, there is a way.
Little else captures this situation with the passion and conviction of Black Mirror’s “Hated in the Nation”. This episode is set in a disturbingly familiar London and follows Detective Karin Parke (pictured above) as she investigates a string of mysterious deaths.
Parke eventually discovers that these deaths are caused by bee drones. The small robots replace extinct bees and are essential to humanity’s survival. However, they’ve been exploited due to a government backdoor and are now being used to kill civilians. In particular, they are programmed to kill whomever Twitter deems the most hated in the nation.
As for its cinematic value, “Hated in the Nation” is often criticized for its convoluted delivery. It tries to do too much so does nothing well. But it does one thing excellently. It illustrates our oncoming dilemma. A need is identified. Some piece of technology fulfils that need. It does its job well. Then, someone uses it in a way it wasn’t meant to.
Drones make enough mistakes when used as intended. What will happen when we lose control?
Unfortunately, “Hated in the Nation” has no answer. It does, however, hold a warning. The more we rely on technology, the more we relinquish control. It predicts a future of ‘small massacres’ we are already seeing. While fundamentally different from the callous, unrestrained mass violence of the past, it is no more humane. If anything, this is the rise of the civilian killer.
We have crafted a murderer with no face and no uniform. It can become anyone and has enemies we don’t know of. With no need to bend to perception, its target will not be only world leaders or suspected terrorists.
Now, anyone hated in the nation is fair game.
References:
Ahmed, Mohiuddin and Paul Haskell-Dowland. “Aerial threat: why drone hacking could be bad news for the military.” The Conversation. Updated October 8, 2019. https://theconversation.com/aerial-threat-why-drone-hacking-could-be-bad-news-for-the-military-124588.
Bonds, Eric. “Humanitized violence: Targeted killings and civilian deaths in the US war against the Islamic State.” Current Sociology 67, no. 3 (2018): 438-455.
Hawes, James, dir. Black Mirror. Season 3, episode 6. “Hated in the Nation.” Aired October 21, 2016, United Kingdom: Netflix, accessed October 26, 2020.
Swart, Mia. “Death by drone: How can states justify targeted killings?” Al Jazeera. Updated July 11, 2020. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/7/11/death-by-drone-how-can-states-justify-targeted-killings.
Maybe to tie in with the theme that the bee robots are out of control, a part of nature, the episode focuses on one main way to determine who dies: democracy. Personally, I doubt that any ill-intentioned hacker would wrest control of drones away from people, then give it back to the people. The democratic Twitter method would be replaced in real life by the hacker or hackers having full control over the killer robots. Honestly, I can’t tell what’s worse: the government having killer drones, cybercriminals having them, or them being beholden to the people. The last is scary because if the majority cast their vote for someone to die, they all become murderers. The act would be so common that condemning someone to die would lose some of its meaning.
We see that online communities of mild-mannered but anonymous individuals can grow to be hateful and toxic cultures. Words of cruelty are so much more tempting when everyone else is saying them. I can only imagine a lynch vote would go the same way.
I remember when I first saw Black Mirror. I watched Be Right Back in my English class in year 12 and I thought it was a really sick show written by fucked up people. I later learned that the show isn’t just about showing twisted futures, it’s about showing the price of progress, and how what seems good to many can turn out to have horrific consequences. I’m a big fan of the show and I think it has a lot to teach. Drones are a new way of waging warfare and I think it’s interesting how you were able to relate the civilian casualties resulting in the increased use of drones to the show. Drones are not only a sophisticated way to wage war but also much more dangerous and I love the way you were able to bring that up. Another thing to ask could be the question of if drones are a more humane way to kill people? Sure, it’s more sophisticated and more precise, but could it be considered to be less respectable to die by the ‘hand’ of a computer or by the hand of another human? I guess it wouldn’t matter much, you’re dying anyway, but it’s another thing to think about.