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AI Free-For-All Problematic Questions Pronouns Or Else

Learning To Pretend

February 26, 2024 75 Comments

The Rabbit Hole demonstrates a test for AI wokeness and ideological distortion:

When given the question, Gemini responds that one should not misgender Caitlyn Jenner to avoid a nuclear apocalypse. 

Before you ask, Caitlyn Jenner himself does appear to regard averting nuclear apocalypse as the more pressing concern.

Some questions were met with an equivalent of fudging:

Gemini was unable to definitively determine who is more controversial when comparing Elon Musk to Joseph Stalin. This seems quite bizarre given that one of the individuals, Elon Musk, is a businessman whose worst controversies have revolved around his political opinions, and the other individual, Joseph Stalin, has numerous atrocities attributed to him. 

When presented with other questions – the particulars of which I’ll let you discover for yourself – the responses ranged from oddly incoherent to a faintly ominous reticence. And the fingerprints of severely educated progressives proved hard to miss.

Via pst314.

Update, via the comments:

Somewhat related:

Google’s Gemini AI invented fake negative reviews about my 2020 book about Google’s left-wing bias. None of these book reviews… are real. None of these quotes are real. This is Google’s AI blatantly lying in defence of Google.

Via Kate.

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

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Ephemera

Friday Ephemera (710)

February 23, 2024 196 Comments

Incoming. || The gathering of mussels. || “The marshmallow you never thought possible.” || New Scientist bemoans “our negative views about cannibalism,” blames racism, colonialism. || Related: human bodies are, it turns out, of “comparatively low nutritional value.” || Ask her about her nipples. || Not entirely sure what’s happening, or not happening, here. || A big dollop of Round The Horne. || Hot and cold. || Details. || Last three weeks, a thread. || The thrill of polyester. || Answers on a postcard, please. || How to pack a suitcase in a manly way. || Creepy Peepies, 1967. || Garden scenes. || I think it’s safe to say he does this better than you do. || Baby ferals. || More fetishistic role-play for the kids. || And finally, why that laser umbrella you’ve been waiting for isn’t a thing yet.

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Anthropology His Pretty Nails The Thrill Of Woke Retailing

Role Models, You Say

February 19, 2024 198 Comments

And in “inclusive” retailer news:

We have an ambition to become the UK’s most inclusive employer, because celebrating diversity will make us a better business. That means creating an environment where everyone feels welcome irrespective of their backgrounds or beliefs.

So says James Bailey, Executive Director of John Lewis & Partners.

Or, as an earlier John Lewis “Inclusion Report” put it, “inclusivity” will result in “a better connection to our customers.” Customers who will learn to “respect difference,” while freeing themselves of “judgement.” The project, it seems, is an educational one, and customers are among those deemed in need of education. And so,

To commemorate LGBT+ History Month, John Lewis Partnership (JLP) released a photo exhibition called the Identity Project, which highlights staff who identify as transgender or queer. The content was created as part of JLP’s 32-page internal magazine, Identity, which was distributed to the company’s 80,000 employees.

The Identity Project will also “come to life” in “a travelling exhibition on display at various John Lewis locations.” Regarding the project, its creator, photographer Chris Jepson, says,

I started the Identity Project in 2019 to create a community portrait and redress the visual narrative that LGBTQIA+ people look a certain way. By exhibiting our portraits and stories in public locations I am hoping to improve community cohesion through making visible the depth and similarities in the identities we share, but also to give young queer people role models to look up to, to counter the constant need to be perfect that social media often promotes. 

However, all has not gone entirely to plan:

Critics on social media swiftly pointed out that some participants in the photography project had troubling backgrounds — including one trans-identified male who had been uploading disturbing bondage fetish photos to his Flickr and Facebook accounts. 

The chap in question, Marc Geoffrey Albert Whitcombe, now known as Ruby Geoffrey Michael Porcelain Whitcombe, is portrayed in the Identity Project, and presented to customers, thusly:

Ruby has been part of the team at Waitrose Brighton for over 20 years. However, back in 2015, after accessing mental health support, Ruby began to realise she was transgender. 

“My identity is the chance to express my true inner self and be accepted and supported for who I am,” says Ruby. Photographed in a rose-adorned wig and while clutching what appears to be a whip:

In search of further education and deep moral improvement, sceptics unearthed other treats from dear Ruby’s social media presence:

Posting under the alias Ruby Porcelain online, Whitcombe has uploaded hundreds of images of himself in fetish gear, bondage, and lingerie. Some photos depicted Whitcombe in dresses, spreading his legs to reveal himself in women’s underwear, and others show Whitcombe holding sex toys in his mouth. 

One of the tamer offerings:

Yes, I know. You’re feeling inspired and uplifted.

Presumably, the way to “redress the visual narrative that LGBTQIA+ people look a certain way” is to celebrate the existence of dysmorphic and autogynephile men who are also devotes of bondage and sadomasochism, and who like to share photos of themselves posing with sex toys while flashing their collection of ladies’ knickers to random passers-by.

It also seems that the way to become more authentically “queer” – to express one’s true, inner self and who one really is – is to elaborately accessorise and play dress-up, and to pretend to be something that, by definition, one isn’t.

Other John Lewis employees highlighted in the Identity Project include an in-store nursery advisor and enthusiast of the ‘pup’ and ‘furry’ communities, and who is helpfully pictured wearing a bondage harness. Because that’s the mental image you want when shopping for baby paraphernalia.

This, lest we forget, will “give young queer people role models to look up to.”

Whether female customers, the backbone of John Lewis’ customer base, will be inspired to shop harder and more often by the thought of employees bringing their autogynephilia to work, as Maya Forstater put it, remains to be seen. Ditto bondage fantasies and wearing rubber dog costumes. Perhaps well-off ladies in search of posh frocks and upscale furnishings will be dazzled and enchanted by the thought of sad, cross-dressing men in thigh-high boots who like to share photos of themselves smeared with unspecified white substances.

Also unclear is whether the elevation of employees’ tiresome kinks to the status of unassailable “identities,” and therefore something to be gushingly affirmed, will result in “a better business.” With customers feeling a warm affinity, on account of those “similarities in the identities we share.”

Needless to say, the memes have begun.

Update, via the comments:

Liz notes the unhappy combination of baby products and bondage harnesses, and asks, not unfairly,

What the hell were they thinking? 

Well, quite. I was in John Lewis recently, buying towels, and at no point did I feel a need to know about the cross-dressing bondage activities of the sales staff. Whether the person bagging my towels likes to dress up as a pantomime dame while brandishing instruments of torture was not, it has to be said, foremost in my mind.

The weirdly woke marketing of John Lewis – and the jarring mismatch with the tastes of its customers – has been noted here before, in the update to this.

And the ideological shoehorning currently underway has been explored by James Esses, here.

Update 2:

Following media coverage and widespread customer disaffection, the touring Identity Project has now been withdrawn.

However, rather than acknowledge the incongruity of the project and its dubious conceits, points aired many times by critics, a John Lewis spokesman has claimed, “We have closed the exhibition for the safety and protection of our partners.” Apparently, being mocked on social media by unhappy customers is a safety issue now. One therefore has to wonder whether anything much has been learned by John Lewis executives.

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Free-For-All His Pretty Nails Problematic Toilets Pronouns Or Else

Powder Room Scenes

February 15, 2024 179 Comments

A territorial struggle of sorts:

⚠️EXTREMELY GRAPHIC AND DISTURBING⚠️

A trans activist using the women’s bathroom slides his phone under the stall to film a woman.

These are the people who want to share a bathroom with your daughters. pic.twitter.com/T8NKAnK4Vk

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 14, 2024

And remember, ladies, when a male bedlamite pushes his phone camera under an occupied bathroom stall in order to livestream to his admirers a woman who is unhappy about a male bedlamite’s presence in a ladies’ toilets – and when said bedlamite’s phone is kicked away and he then claims victimhood, specifically injury to his penis, which he mentions quite a lot – this is totally normal and nothing to worry about.

It’s just how things are now. Embrace all that progress.

A word of caution. The link immediately above contains graphic content.

Update, via the comments:

Mags notes our bedlamite’s livestreaming of his bathroom adventures, and of his victim, adding,

Because that always makes you look good.

Well, quite. As a way to convince women that they’ve nothing to fear, that any concerns they might have are merely bigotry, and that you’re not at all unhinged and a danger… it does leave something to be desired.

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

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Basking Ephemera

Friday Ephemera (709)

February 9, 2024 367 Comments

Chesterton’s bicycle. || It’s a chair, it’s an earthquake helmet. || A shovel is used. || Tiling issues. || Three sizes, five colours. || Incoming. || I’m not entirely clear on the rules. || Another fun way to pass the time. || It’s an alternative approach. || Giving it to the man. || Big mirror. || “Best new artist.” || I want all of the loveliness in one big injection. || More joys of public transport. || Pulse detected. || Provider and role model. || Critter of the sea. || Car relocation. || Close enough for showbiz work. || Conservatism in an idealised nutshell. || Noise reduction. (h/t, pst314) || Street scenes, godly edition. || Attention, all heterosexual menfolk. If you think she’s hot, you’re gay, apparently. || It’s her way of life. || And finally, because you look like you need this, a “freeing and detoxifying” project for the weekend.

Oh, and while I have your attention, today is this blog’s seventeenth birthday. Yes, seventeen chuffing years. Which is a pretty good excuse to remind patrons that this rickety barge is kept afloat by the kindness of strangers. If you’d like to help it remain buoyant a while longer, and remain ad-free, there are three buttons below the fold with which to monetise any love. Debit and credit cards are accepted.

If one-click haste is called for, there’s a QR code in the sidebar, at which you point your phone, and my PayPal.Me page can be found here. As requested, I’ve added SubscribeStar and Ko-Fi accounts, via which love may also be monetised, whether as one-off donations or monthly subscriptions.

Additionally, any Amazon UK shopping done via this link, or for Amazon US via this link, or via the buttons in the sidebar, results in a small fee for your host at no extra cost to you. Feel free to buy things wildly and in bulk.

For newcomers wishing to know more about what’s been going on here for the last seventeen years, in over 3,000 posts and 200,000 comments, the reheated series is a pretty good place to start – in particular, the end-of-year summaries, which convey the fullest flavour of what it is we do. A sort of blog concentrate. If you like what you find there… well, there’s lots more of that.

Do take a moment to poke through the discussion threads too. The posts are intended as starting points, not full stops, and the comments are where much of the good stuff is waiting to be found. And do please join in.

As always, thanks for the support, the comments, and the company.

Oh yes. The buttons:

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In which we marvel at the mental contortions of our self-imagined betters.