In July exactly after receiving an email offering an “ideal” AI content creator girlfriend Harrison Stewart started TikTok sketch using a “buzz” slur against artificial intelligence.
Pretending to be a disapproving father, he confronted his daughter’s robot boyfriend in 2044. “What’s your name? No, no. It’s model number 626 S Series. That’s your name, you dirty bastard,” Stewart says in the video.
As one of the original creators of jingle-themed TikToks, Stewart, who goes by the online name Chaise, was dubbed the “jingle guy” by his fans after racking up millions of views. However, in August, a 19-year-old content creator, who is black, announced that he will not post any more videos on this topic. He stated that the joke and reactions to it had become racist.
“When I go into the comments section and people start calling me ‘cligger’ or ‘clanka’ or ‘You are “dirty clunk” – not saying these insults at artificial intelligence and electronics, but at me – I don’t find it funny or funny at all,” Stewart explains in the video.
The origins of the word “clanker” date back to late 1950s writer William Tenn, who used the word to describe robots in science fiction films, but its adoption as something of an insult can be traced back to the Star Wars franchise, where it was used as a derogatory term for antagonist droids and soldiers. In recent months, it has become something of a protest against the rapid implementation of artificial intelligence in virtually every aspect of society.
Over the past three months, the term has received over 2 million Google searches and at least hundreds of thousands of social media posts. WX post in July, Sen. Ruben Gallego, R-Ariz., wrote: “Tired of yelling “Representative” into the phone 10 times just to talk to a human? My recent bill ensures you don’t have to talk to a clunker if you don’t want to.”
However, on TikTok and Instagram, the ongoing backlash against artificial intelligence has taken the form of compact video skits depicting a future in which robots are fully integrated into society. The term “buzzers” along with “tinskins”, “wirebacks” and “oil bleeders” are used as pejoratives in these sketches. However, in some of these sketches, it appears that the buzzers are standing in for Black people, perpetuating racist tropes and scenarios harkening back to the pre-civil rights era.