Our cameras have helped us identify the person who broke into our car a few weeks ago. That is not theater.
My neighbors have posted many reasonably clear, useful images of break-ins and shared them with the police. It has done no actual good - no items recovered, no perpetrators dissuaded.
Footage does nothing to deter people and it has no consequences. It can only be used against the interest of common people - because stopping crime does not lead to meaningful profit. Selling security devices to folks, charging per the hour for security checkpoints, selling x-ray machines, well, that's very profitable - but you can't do those things when nobody is concerned. Harvesting data, selling facial profiles - again, profitable, extremely so.