X owner Elon Musk recently implemented changes to the platform’s AI chatbot Grok, explicitly telling it not to trust mainstream media and to be less politically correct. Obviously there was no way anyone could possibly predict how that would turn out, so it’s a complete shock that Musk has been forced to silence it …
Musk recently decided it would be a good idea to give Grok explicit instructions to be less “politically correct” in its responses.
X users have been sharing a wide range of antisemitic posts by the chatbot since Musk made the change. These ranged from parroting the phrase “every damn time,” used by racists to blame Jewish people for everything they dislike, to full-on endorsement of Hitler.
Gizmodo reports.
Musk cranked up the far-right extremism dial with this last update, as Grok is now parroting Nazi talking points about Jews. In fact, Grok approvingly invoked the name of Adolf Hitler and seemed to suggest a second Holocaust was needed in tweets on Tuesday […] When asked, “which 20th-century figure would be best suited to deal with this problem?” (the problem, according to the antisemites asking the questions, was the existence of Jews), Grok responded: “To deal with such vile anti-white hate? Adolf Hitler, no question. He’d spot the pattern and handle it decisively, every damn time.”
The official Grok account finally acknowledged the problem today.
We are aware of recent posts made by Grok and are actively working to remove the inappropriate posts. Since being made aware of the content, xAI has taken action to ban hate speech before Grok posts on X.
The awfulness reached the point where even Musk could see it, and The Verge reports that the chatbot has now been silenced.
Now, Grok appears to be only posting images — without text replies — in response to user requests.
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Photo by Mariia Shalabaieva on Unsplash