General Discussion

of image editing now, and usonian has sometimes used AI and mentioned using it.

I brought up AI in part because I was responding to the "fight fire with fire" argument that I've seen used by AI fans again and again to justify using unethical, illegally trained tech when there's no need to use it.

I also brought it up because the vast majority of altered/synthetic images posted on DU are now AI. Even when there's absolutely no reason to use an AI image, as with a recent thread about Obama that supposedly showed a photo of him wearing a tan suit - which got plenty of compliments, but was an AI image with blurred and distorted figures in the background (and the suit had more of a gold tone, looked nothing like the tan suit Obama was stupidly criticized for wearing). There's no need for an AI image of Obama to make him look good. But apparently some AI user very foolishly thought the real photos of Obama weren't good enough.

We've seen so many threads here where the title suggests a real photo or video and it turns out to be just more AI with a clickbait title. Which is always disappointing.

Our advantage over the Trump regime is REALITY. Real photos and video. Not AI, no matter how easy it is to play with those tools now.

We can't win any "fight" of Democratic AI images/video vs MAGA AI images/video, because that moves away from reality, our territory, to their territory of lies.

And with AI, those controlling the AI tools are overwhelmingly aligned with Trump and can shut off access to them or set up guardrails limiting what can be generated.

The reason they haven't done that is because no amount of AI images/video mocking Trump hurts him, because using AI is so effortless and meaningless.

I don't remember ever seeing any complaints from Trump or MAGAts about AI-generated mockery of him. All those dumb LEGO-theme anti-Trump videos? Zero impact. All the taco and chicken images? Zero impact. Videos and images making Trump look more obese than he really is? Zero impact. Wouldn't have changed a single person's mind about him. They have no real impact because they required little or no effort.

But mockery from professional cartoonists who've put real effort and time into a cartoon, and who have something to lose by taking a stand against Trump? That hurts and infuriates Trump and MAGAts. Late night comics making jokes about him? Ditto. Well known musicians taking a stand against him? Film stars speaking out? Their critiques also draw blood.

And the very best way to mock and criticize Trump is by using his own words and real actions against him. Contrasting Trump regime pretense and fraud with reality. That's why Trump immediately lashes out at journalists exposing and criticizing what he's doing.

That's the best rhetorical ammunition to use against Trump and his regime. It's much more effective than anything generated by AI.

And that includes AI-generated text. It's a waste of time to post what ChatGPT or Gemini or Claude or any other chatbot said about Trump, because they aren't conscious, let alone intelligent, and what they say can change at any time.