What do AI models mean for feminine beauty standards?

I am fascinated by the impact of technology and social media on how we view ourselves and move around our daily lives in the current zeitgeist. My undergraduate dissertation, submitted in May this year, examined how digital simulation and technological surveillance impact selfhood and identity, from the power they have to dissolve typical concepts of privacy, to its actual influencing of everyday behaviours. As I hear increasingly about a new wave of AI influencers and models (@lilmiquela on Instagram is just one example), I am seeing my interests pan out in real time.

In an article by FashionUnited, a new completely AI-based modelling agency is promoted. These models (pictured left, image credit to Hum.ai.n) are both completely computer animated, and uncannily human-looking. The article summarises, 'Called Hum.ai.n, the agency seeks to break barriers presenting a new form of beauty, characterized by diversity, individuality and inclusivity, but most importantly breaking the boundaries of gender and what constitutes "physical beauty"'. Although this rhetoric of boundary breaking sounds good on paper, I can't help but feel concerned about what this means for beauty standards. How do we ensure inclusivity when these 'people' are quite literally being designed by the engineers, artists, and coders who are selling them as models? At a time when diversity and body positivity is finally being seen in mainstream modelling campaigns, AI threatens to once again abstract beauty from humanity.

As much as we are trying to work against it, traditional concepts of attractiveness still have a massive power over the commercial realm. Beauty sells. How, then, do we ensure that AI models will not contribute further to the harm exerted by beauty ideals? When things such as cellulite, stretch marks, and acne are optional, what will justify their presence in this new modelling world? To me, this veers dangerously towards a world of including flaws not because they are features of real people, but as a tokenistic gesture towards authenticity in an industry that already excludes the majority.

As an effort at self care, I make a conscious effort not to follow influencers, celebrities or models on social media. However, for many people, this is the primary way that they operate online. Celebrity culture has increased in both diversity and power with the rise of social media; its associated beauty ideals have followed suit. What will happen to a generation of young people when their role models don't even have pores, or jobs, or insecurities? Will we find ourselves aspiring towards bodies and facial features that are no more real than our botched attempts at replicating ourselves on Sims 3? These models look the way they do not because of some dramatic diet or workout plan, or even surgery, but simply because someone coded them to look that way.

We can remain critical of photoshopped, posed, and edited images because we have a physical sense of the illusion it creates; we can compare to (or imagine) the 'reality' of these images. This new wave of AI modelling and influencing disturbs this altogether, as image is transformed into reality, and computer pixels masquerade as fully-formed identities. How will we reconcile the insecurities that this may create when we have no 'insta vs. reality' reassurances to fall back on? As people are increasingly asking for facial surgeries which replicate Instagram filters, are we seeing a move towards social media as reality? Will people soon be requesting surgeries to look like these new AI models? Shudder.

Its long-term effects are yet to be seen, but this move towards artificial intelligence in the beauty and modelling industries is simultaneously exciting and terrifying as it both opens up possibilities, and threatens reality as we know it. I've asked many questions and answered few, but I am intrigued to see how this sector develops and influences our lives.