Omniscient: Law and Order

     In Omniscient, the entire story revolves around the law, criminal activity, and legality of the surveillance. As stated in previous posts the city in which Nina and other live is not the standard of a nation, but instead for a single city. Outside this city law functions, much like it currently does with police and detectives preventing and solving crime. The city with its drones nullifies their use entirely. The entire legal system for the city is the drone, crimes cannot be reported without your drone going off, and this fits well with the whole point of the show, why did Nina's fathers' drone not signal when he was murdered? Legally he is dead, but his drone did not go off and this causes the entire catalyst on why Nina wants to find out why, is there a deep state, a sinister plan, etc. But no matter how that plays out the fact is for the city Nina lives in, the legal issue of drones is null, as it is the system that their law runs on. How can you call into question the legality of the very thing regulating it?


    Lawbreaking is such a taboo in the city, not because people are being watched but because it is such a rare event. Only 30 oddish prisoners make up the entire city jail, all for crimes they know they were gonna get caught committing, but in many cases felt they hit a breaking point. Now the mental toll of being under surveillance may come into question here, and the legality of such things as the small petty crime that is not necessarily illegal but immoral, that led to them either committing a major crime in revenge, or pity. One such criminal robbed to pay for his children's medical expenses, another committed assault because her husband was verbally abusive. So how can a crime that is not technically a crime be reported in other words how can there be human context or emotion in a case where spousal abuse is present. Due to technology neutrality and non-emotional context, the drone can't tell the woman's side of the story, just the facts which is the man never physically harmed her, but she did to him. 


Promotional Poster for Omniscient, Showing Drones Around Characters.


   Nina also commits several crimes herself, purposely destroying drones and stealing only getting away with it due to her advanced knowledge of the industry at work for her "safety".  Just because she outsmarts the system doesn't mean she isn't a criminal she simply just has not been caught, From Nina's perspective she is justified fighting against a system with flaws, one she has grown up in and rarely questioned until now. Nonetheless, she still commits a crime, so is the relationship between Omniscient safety and accountability, or does it simply benefit those who know how to get around the system, especially say those who built it? This is the case for one of the CEOs of Omniscient who routinely leaves the city just to commit a crime, where he cannot be caught by the very technology he made. So is he master or slave to his securities and industry, and will he ever be held accountable like the people who live under surveillance are?


Technology may be judge, jury, and executioner in the city but ultimately it is whether you are caught or not that makes your relationship with the system a problematic, or advantageous one. 


Netflix Promotional Poster Showing Surveillance Technology around Omnscient HQ


    

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