Stanford University has apologized for using AI to swap out a Hispanic male student for a black female in a promotional photo, calling the decision a “serious error in judgment.” The university didn’t stop at transforming a student’s race and gender to promote “diversity” — it also made both a white male student and an asian female student noticeably slimmer in the image.
“Not only the fact that the image was altered, but the ways in which it was altered, reflect a serious error in judgment,” a Stanford spokesperson told NBC News. “We have apologized to the students in the photo whose images were altered or erased.”
“Quite simply, this was wrong and should never have happened,” the university spokesperson added, before noting that the school has since launched an investigation so it can “put in place protocols to prevent it from happening again.”
Garret Molloy, editor-in-chief of the Stanford Review, which first reported on the incident, told NBC News that he believes the university was “trying to create this kind of artificial perception of diversity.”
“In the past, we did that with college photographers going around campus and trying to find a diverse friend group,” he said. “Those college photographers are now being replaced with AI.”
Molloy added that the AI-altered promotional photo — which he noted had been placed on welcome banners around campus — have since been taken down.
Stanford has faced widespread mockery on social media for its overzealous pursuit of diversity.
The Stanford Residential & Dining Enterprises was caught using AI to switch out a Hispanic male for a black female in one of its advertisements, as well as altering the faces of two other students to make them appear noticeably slimmer.
“Seeing my identity changed and being left out of the picture made me feel, in a way, silenced and erased from a representation that was supposed to include me,” Billy Ramirez, the male student who was removed from the photo, told the Stanford Review.
Alana Mastrangelo-Wrask is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on Facebook and X at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.