Sigh, ACLU, is this really that high a priority in the list of rights we need to fight for right now? Really?
Also, am I missing something, or wouldn’t these arguments fall apart under the lens of slander? If you make a sufficiently convincing AI replica that is indistinguishable from reality of someone’s face and/or voice, and use it to say untrue things about them, how is that speech materially different from directly saying “So-and-so said x” when they didn’t? Or worse, making videos of them doing something terrible, or out of character, or even mundane? If that is speech sufficient to be potentially covered by the first amendment, it is slander imo. Even parody has to be somewhat distinct from reality to not be slander/libel, why would this be different?
It’s important we don’t let people of influence insulate themselves from criticism using this as a scapegoat.
For me its more the risk that making real and fake speech indistinguishable renders any speech meaningless.
ACLU, is this really that high a priority in the list of rights we need to fight for right now?
You say this like the ACLU isn’t doing a ton of other things at the same time. Here are their 2024 plans, for example. See also https://www.aclu.org/news
Besides that, these laws are being passed now, and they’re being passed by people who have no clue what they’re talking about. It wouldn’t make sense for them to wait until the laws are passed to challenge them rather than lobbying to prevent them from being passed in the first place.
wouldn’t these arguments fall apart under the lens of slander?
If you disseminate a deepfake with slanderous intent then your actions are likely already illegal under existing laws, yes, and that’s exactly the point. The ACLU is opposing new laws that are over-broad. There are gaps in the laws, and we should fill those gaps, but not at the expense of infringing upon free speech.
Oh, I completely understand you’re correct here, I’m just, so, so tired of fighting to keep all the sociopolitical gains of the past 10-50 years, y’know? I know they have a lot going on, it just feels shitty considering the rest of the political climate.
They want you to be tired. They will never stop bringing the fight, because to them our freedom is an existential threat to their existence.
Keep up the fight for personal liberty. And make no mistake—it is a fight.
I stopped supporting the ACLU when they wrote an op-ed supporting Citizens United.
They have their heads firmly up their asses on a handful of fairly crucial issues.
Precisely. I stopped supporting them when I found those articles.
There’s a flaw in the core premise of their argument, and it goes to the intent of equality that should (and I consider to) be an intrinsic intent of the Bill of Rights and its amendments:
- Speech is not subject to the law of scarcity, thus it is free (as in beer); any person with a steady supply of air, food, and water can speak indefinitely if they so wish. Thus, any citizen can engage in speech indefinitely, in theory.
- Money-as-speech is subject to the law of scarcity, and thus normal citizens can run out of it. Only the ultra wealthy can truly just spend money without real concern for how much they have left. Thus, the wealthy have a disproportionately larger (by several orders of magnitude) amount of money-as-speech available to them, by simple virtue of the fact that they’re crazy rich. Rich people can “speak” in this context essentially indefinitely, while normal people cannot; this is obvious, fundamental, and definitely not equal or egalitarian.
The fact that the ACLU straight up refuses to acknowledge any of this is absolutely asinine, in my opinion. CU is the foundation of a LOT of issues in our modern politics. It basically made it legal to buy elections.
Doesn’t rhyme quite as good as the Beastie Boys version of the song.
As Mary Anne Franks, a George Washington University law professor and a leading advocate for strict anti-deepfake rules, told WIRED in an email, “The obvious flaw in the ‘We already have laws to deal with this’ argument is that if this were true, we wouldn’t be witnessing an explosion of this abuse with no corresponding increase in the filing of criminal charges.”
We’re certainly witnessing an explosion of media coverage of abusive deepfakes, as with coverage of everything else AI-related. But if there’s no increase in criminal cases, what’s the evidence that the “explosion” is more than that?
Look at this in the same light as the 2nd amendment: bearing arms was more compatible with society when the “arms” were mechanically limited in their power/capability. Gun laws have matured to some degree since then, restricting or banning higher powered weaponry available today.
Maybe slander/defamation protections are not agile or comprehensive enough to curtail the proliferation of AI-generated material. It is certainly much easier to malign or impersonate someone now than ever before.
I really don’t think software will ever be successfully restricted by the government, but the hardware that is behind it might end up with some form of firmware-based lockout technology that limits AI capabilities to approved models providing a certificate signed by the hardware maker (after vetting the submission for legally-mandated safety or anti-abuse features).
But the horse has already left the barn. Even the current level of generative AI technology is fully capable of fooling just about anyone, and will never be stopped without advancements in AI detection tools or some very aggressive changes to the law. Here come the historic GPU bans of the late 20’s!
Yeah, freedom of the press was fine when only a few rich people could afford their own printing press, but now that everyone has internet, we really need to do something about that. These stupid peasants ruin everything.
I really don’t think software will ever be successfully restricted by the government, but the hardware that is behind it might end up with some form of firmware-based lockout technology that limits AI capabilities to approved models providing a certificate signed by the hardware maker (after vetting the submission for legally-mandated safety or anti-abuse features).
Exactly! All computers must be bugged and surveilled 24/7. Telescreens in every room must be 2-way. That is the lesson of George Orwell’s 1984.
The ACLU sounds like a good idea until one realizes that “civil rights” is a vague category with almost no connection to actual freedom.
These are the same people who sold out humans for corporate “freeze peach” in Citizens United. ETC. There’s no point in supporting a bunch of irrational ideologues.
Conservatives hate the ACLU. That’s not new.
