Donald Trump being arrested? Putin kneels before Chinese President Xi? Can we still believe our eyes? Unfortunately no, says Nicole Diekmann.
Donald Trump is haunting the media again. Sure, because he could be the first ex-president to face charges. But also because Trump’s announcement that he would be arrested actually happened. At least if you didn’t look too closely. Because since yesterday a picture of the ex-president has been circulating, showing him being visibly carried away by police officers against his will.
If you look closely, you can see: This is a fake. Or, as Trump, who was convicted of being a notorious liar, would put it: The picture shows “alternative facts”. He and his fans have always worked with that, with untruth. It’s part of his business model. In speeches, on Twitter, after the allegedly stolen election – again and again, always blatantly and shamelessly, and quite successfully. However, only for a while and, at least for those interested in the truth, mostly clearly identifiable as what it was: outright lies.
But the picture of Trump’s alleged arrest shows that artificial intelligence is playing into this strategy’s hands. In other words: AI can play Trump on the team. True, the fake is not yet perfect. Trump’s hair falls at an odd angle, and it’s also what we TV folks call “blurred”: it’s out of focus. This shows small weaknesses of artificial intelligence. Still.
As I said: If you look closely, you can see it. I openly admit: I didn’t recognize it immediately yesterday. Because, sometimes it’s so disturbingly simple, I didn’t have my glasses on. If you don’t look closely for other, totally human and profane reasons, such as lack of time or just superficial interest, it seems reasonably realistic. Of course, also because Trump had already announced it.
The television journalist Nicole Diekmann is known as a serious political reporter. Completely different, namely quick-witted and funny, you can see them on Twitter – where she has over 120,000 fans. There she fillets political and social excitement around the Internet. Your book “The Shitstorm Republic” is available everywhere, you Blog can be found here.
Decoupled from Donald Trump, this is dangerous. Pretty dangerous even. Trump’s supporters are known to have a tendency to escalate. That’s exactly why Trump announced at the weekend that his arrest was imminent: to stir up the masses. In such a heated mood, such a photo can be the decisive drop of spirit that sets everything on fire.
Exactly this group of followers, like all of us, has access to not so complex systems, with the help of which you can tinker any nonsense relatively quickly. And the machine does what the human wants. She doesn’t ask for decency.
Journalists need to take a closer look. But that won’t always be enough
Of course, it makes a difference whether I address this topic over a cup of coffee or, for example, professionally. I would claim for myself to look twice and three times as keenly. With glasses. Not only with the real one on my nose, but also with the professional one. But not everyone does that, of course not.
We’ve all known for years how quickly people have fallen for fake social media accounts. This also happens to us journalists from time to time. Then we unintentionally spread fake news, which poses a risk for democracies even when the global political situation is not as tense as it is at the moment.
Let’s turn our gaze from the insane ex-politician, who fortunately is no longer quite so dangerous, to another incumbent. On Vladimir Putin and his war against Ukraine.
A picture of him has also been circulating since yesterday, which has provided plenty to talk about and which a US tech journalist also exposed in great detail and knowledge as a fake:
In this image, we see warmonger Putin side-on, kneeling submissively before his powerful ally, the Chinese President, and burrowing his head in his lap. A disturbing picture. And not real either, albeit less obvious than in the picture of Trump.
