A bipartisan group of US senators introduced a bill Tuesday that would criminalize the spread of nonconsensual, sexualized images generated by artificial intelligence. The measure comes in direct response to the proliferation of pornographic AI-made images of Taylor Swift on X, formerly Twitter, in recent days.
The measure would allow victims depicted in nude or sexually explicit “digital forgeries” to seek a civil penalty against “individuals who produced or possessed the forgery with intent to distribute it” or anyone who received the material knowing it was not made with consent. Dick Durbin, the US Senate majority whip, and senators Lindsey Graham, Amy Klobuchar and Josh Hawley are behind the bill, known as the Disrupt Explicit Forged Images and Non-Consensual Edits Act of 2024, or the “Defiance Act.”
I agree the issue is one of puritan attitudes toward sex and nudity. If no one gave a fuck about nude images, they wouldn’t be humiliating, and if they weren’t humiliating then the victim wouldn’t really even be a victim.
However we live in the world we live in and people do find it embarrassing and humiliating to have nude images of themselves made public, even fakes, and I don’t think it’s right to tell them they can’t feel that way.
They shouldn’t ever have been made to feel their bodies are something to be embarrassed about, but they have been and it can’t be undone with wishful thinking. Societal change must come first. But that complication aside, I agree with you completely.