We're going to breakpoint, a daily look, in an ever-changing culture through the lens of unchanging truth.

For the Colson Center, I'm John Stone Street.

Any technology will, because of the human condition, eventually be used for nefarious purposes.

AI is no exception, whether it's students having chat GPT write their essays or Google Gemini rewriting history

through fabricated images. Even more consequential by far is how AI has transformed the production

and harmful reach of pornographic content. For example, what's called AI pimping is a term used

to describe pornography generated by AI using authentic

photographs of real people, usually done for profit or revenge.

Among the darkest abuses are pornographic images of classmates that are created and shared

by students as young as in middle school.

Other instances include anonymous AI influencers

who steal content, claim it as their own, and then generate profit by posting it to so-called

adult content platforms. Even Taylor Swift has been a victim of pornographic deep fakes. And there's a

softer form of AI pimping that's found in apps that give users the

ability to create videos of them kissing their crush. Though consent here, which is the only

virtue that's supposed to matter after the so-called liberation of the sexual revolution,

has been deeply violated here, it's not the only or even chief problem. Like any form of pornography,

the harms of so-called AI pimping are not mitigated if individuals are 18 years old or

compensated and have somehow given their consent. To dehumanize oneself is, after all,

perhaps the saddest form of dehumanization, but it's still dehumanization nonetheless.

The porn industry in the United States alone generates somewhere between $15 and $97 billion a year.

By comparison, Hollywood took in just $7.5 billion in 2022.

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