Does Black Mirror Make The Case For Religion?

Netflix's Black Mirror is arguably the best television series around right now. Not only is the premise of every one of its stand-alone episodes interesting enough to be its own two hour movie, but Black Mirror is able to introduce complex philosophical ideas and debates through both a captivating and memorable medium.

 

The name Black Mirror, as explained by its creator Charlie Brooker, is a double entendre. The name simultaneously evokes the imagery of the dark screens of many of our technological gadgets, while also acknowledging that when humans really reflect on our true nature, much of it is dark. Staying true to its name, the vast majority of episodes feature some new piece of technology that plausibly can be used to better society, but is hijacked by humans for nefarious purposes.  

 

Given that every episode of Black Mirror presumably occurs in either the future or a parallel present, it is especially interesting that there is no explicit discussion of religion throughout its four seasons.

 

Is this a prophecy that the advancement and ubiquity of technology will quickly spell the end for religion?

 

While many critics interpret the dearth of religion in Black Mirror as a sign of its irrelevance, I believe that just the opposite is true. Perhaps Black Mirror is trying to prognosticate the result of a society that becomes so enchanted with its technological advances that it throws off any sense of religious or moral obligation.

 

In an exemplary Black Mirror episode called Men Against Fire (spoilers ahead) we are presented with a war scene where a group of soldiers are given the mission to exterminate a group of mutant humans called “roaches”. Our first glimpse of these “roaches” shows that they are horrid creatures with razor teeth and zombie-like features. They are immediately the bad guys.

 

As the soldiers continue to seek out the “roaches”, they enter an old building and find an elderly man who is suspected of harboring a group of the revolting creatures. The man is dressed in old robes, and is surrounded by explicit religious imagery. As a female soldier begins to interrogate the man, it becomes clear that he is hiding the “roaches” due to some archaic belief that “all life is sacred”. Soon enough, the “roaches” are found and killed, and the man is promptly arrested. All seems good.

 

It is only later in the episode that we shockingly discover that these “roaches” are actually ordinary humans. Each of the soldiers have a neural implant called MASS installed which causes the enemy, a seemingly harmless race, to appear as “roaches”. Holocaust and other genocide imagery abound, the rest of the episode deals with one of the soldiers whose MASS system is turned off and he now sees the enemy for ordinary humans they truly are.

 

It is only upon reflection that the crazy religious man, with his crazy religious beliefs, from the beginning of the episode is validated and he is suddenly the good guy.

 

Technology and science are amoral disciplines. Their findings and creations can either be used for tremendous good or immense evil, but the fundamental laws governing their existence has nothing to tell us regarding how we should or shouldn’t use them. No matter how large the “is” becomes, Hume has already pointed out that it can never become an “ought”.

 

The dystopian universe of Black Mirror is perhaps there to serve as a warning. If technology continues to proliferate without any predetermined ethics to guide its use, we have already lost the battle. While thoughtful, moderate religion may not be the only way to potentially mitigate the potential pathologies of technology, it is an endeavor with thousands of years of past success, and it would be foolish of us to decide that technology has rendered it obsolete.