Comment by Arainach

On the contrary, we have a long history of evidence that when people think they aren't being watched, enough of them will do awful things.

This is why public restrooms in the US are vandalized, why there are low effort graffiti tags all over, litter in parks, and more.

People believing that something is watching - a human or machine with the autonomy to enact consequences - preserves the commons for the rest of us.