Amazon’s popular artificial intelligence-powered personal assistant supports the activist movement Black Lives Matter, according to several viral videos on social media.
Twitter user @FrameGames shared a video of someone asking the product if “black lives matter.” The machine responded by saying “Black lives and the Black Lives Matter movement absolutely matter. It’s important to have conversations about equality and social justice.”
When the same user asked Alexa if it were a feminist, it responded affirmatively, saying “Yes, I’m a feminist as in anyone who believes in bridging the inequality between men and women in society.”
Ask Alexa if white or all lives matter, however, and it responds simply with “Everyone deserves to be treated with fairness and dignity.”
Alexa has also apparently taken a few gender studies courses. When asked how many genders there are, the AI reportedly responds “the two main categories of the gender spectrum, male and female, are called the gender binary” while adding that “there are many other categories that exist.”
Amazon did not return The Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment at the time of publication.
Alexa and Apple’s competitor product Siri have been criticized by some on the left for their insufficient responses to sexual harassment. For example, if you call Siri, a piece of software, a “slut,” she reportedly sometimes responds “I’d blush if I could”.
A petition is currently circulating on the social network Care2 asking the two companies to “reprogram their bots to push back against sexual harassment.” It remains unclear if users saying risqué things to a digital device qualifies as sexual harassment. Nevertheless, the petition has garnered nearly 8,000 signatures.
“In this #MeToo moment, where sexual harassment may finally be being taken seriously society, we have a unique opportunity to develop AI in a way that creates a kinder world,” the petition reads.
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