Reflecting Black surfaces

Seeding the story: Just before heading to Debbie Deer’s Future Frames seminar at the Nia Centre, I read this Wired article that astounded me: A young woman’s controversial account on TikTok about being assaulted while on DoorDash duty begat a bevy of deepfake videos of real Black creators like journalist Mirlie Larose responding to the event. The AI-generated videos appropriated their actual faces, making them say things they never said, and they were racking up tens of thousands of views. I found TikTok accounts dedicated entirely to deepfaking existing Black creators, a form of digital “blackface.”
So I walked into the seminar already a little reflective on the malevolence of AI representation. Then Debbie credibly built the case that AI is a continuation of existing media that historically has and continues to “exact, extract, reproduce, and exclude” Black people from their own stories, if not checked. The Wired article was clearly part of a more pervasive pattern.
When Debbie showed Shudu Gram, the AI-generated Black model created by a white artist, a woman in the audience reflexively said something now imprinted in my mind: “They’ll do anything to not pay us.” I added that it’s also shutting their voices out of the process entirely.

My grain of thought: I’m struck with how ephemeral identity feels right now. How someone could co-opt your image for their own gain. What if somebody deepfakes me? But for Black creators this is already the reality. I was dismayed. But surprising to me, the room was not hopeless. There was an acknowledgement, acceptance, and a will to correct or at least dilute this pattern. I’m still reckoning with that contrast, but I’m glad to see others are taking action.