Google AI Declares Mario Kart Characters Gay, Oops
Google’s new AI Overview feature, which debuted last week, has been freaking everybody out for many reasons — like that AI famously contributes to the destruction of the planet — but in local news, it threatens to absolutely demolish mid-size publishers (e.g, this website), especially as it continues developing content partnerships with major media conglomerates, ensuring their already-secured near-dominance of search results (through swarming and SEO mastery) will gradually become absolute dominance, until little guys like us fade into the ether. It is very bleak!
However, as reported by Them.us, at least Google has cited Autostraddle for one thing: the source of a question regarding how many gay characters are in Mario Kart (Ironically this screenshot has gone viral without any attribution to us).:
These descriptions come from a 2018 Autostraddle humor piece by Abeni Jones, Mario Kart Characters, Ranked by Queerness. It’s an excellent piece and I highly recommend it. Also honestly when I first saw this screenshot, before realizing it came from us, I thought someone had just cooked this up as a joke of what Google AI might say and I was like “wow, those jokes are fucking good.” I should’ve known they were Abeni’s really fucking good jokes!!!
We have declared a lot of things gay around here and hopefully this new Google AI feature will make all of these declarations cannon. Things we have declared gay include:
- Kashi Good Friends Cereal
- Winnie the Pooh
- High-Rise Slim Boyjeans: Painter Edition
- Spirit Halloween’s “Empty Soul Girl on A Swing”
- The name “Alex”
- Olivia Benson
- Disney Channel Original Movie, “The Princess Protection Program”
- The entire suite of 2016-edition Ken Dolls
- Kenicke from Grease
- Pretty much every item on Kayla’s Christmas tree
- Everyone
- Chief Moana
Anyhow all that information is free on the internet for Google to scrape if it wants to, and we look forward to them continuing to cite Good Housekeeping and Forbes and Bustle as the best sources for real true gay information because they have entire SEO departments, despite the 15-year archive of gay information written by gay people that we have right here!!
In all seriousness, as Samantha Riedel cautions, “Tempting as it may seem, though, don’t jump straight to Google and try to generate even more wacky search results in hope of becoming a meme lord. Overview’s “I definitely read the book for this report” statements lose a lot of their charm when compared against the technology’s massive environmental and ethical harms.”
(Did you know that you can join AF+ for just $4 a month to increase our chances of surviving this round of the media apocalypse? Members get an ad-free/ad-lite experience, bonus content and two incredible members-only newlsetters written by me and Drew.)
Other Queer Pop Culture Stories For Your Day:
+ The Double Loss of Under the Bridge: Queer creator Quinn Shephard talks about the beauty and the grief of adapting the Hulu series with the book’s author, Rebecca Godfrey, who died in 2022.
+ Cara Delevingne and Jeremy Pope are writhing in their underwear for Calvin Klein’s Pride Campaign along with Stella Maxwell, Janick Heilijgers, Tinglei Liu, Monet Lauren, Vinson Fraley, Greta Hofer, Diego Pasillas, Mauro van de Kerkhof, and Charlie Knepper.
+ Detroit will host the world’s first queer art biennial: some 170 local, US and international artists will be showcasin their work.
+ Happy Drop Day from Christen Press and Tobin Heath: I think by “drop day” they mean these t-shirts
+ Yellowjackets has started production: This is exciting except I thought they already had and now I am confused.
+ In photos: the best looks from Barcelona’s ‘pervy’ techno lesbian party: MARICAS offers a place where people can be themselves without judgment or inhibition.
+ JK Rowling says loved ones ‘begged’ her to keep trans views to herself: Alas she did not listen, so.
+ “F*** This, Let’s Just Talk About It”: Jodie Foster, Jennifer Aniston and Sofía Vergara are amongst the women in this roundtable of drama actors.
+ WNBA hits highs on three networks, and not just due to Caitlin Clark.
Oh my. That article about the Barcelona lesbian techno party is really something. “…slogan t-shirts cheekily declared allegiance to ‘they/them pussy’, or dared us to resist drugs and violence. ” 🤣
related to the Under the Bridge Vulture interview being republished – I was recently trying to order a copy of Godfrey’s book (I’ve been waiting for a copy to become available through my local library and after spending 6 weeks with dozens of other patrons ahead of me I decided to bite the bullet and order it) and it is backordered at every non-Amazon bookstore I checked, which feels like a win not only for Godfrey (although very sad she wasn’t able to see the show come to fruition and its ripple effects), but also to the memory of Reena and her surviving family, even as I imagine the lingering impacts of the violence, trial, and trauma remain painful as ever. Has anyone (or Riese) read Maggie Nelson’s The Red Parts? I am not a true crime person (At all) but I love Nelson and loved this show, so ordered both Nelson and Godfrey’s books to read in conversation with one another.
i have read “The Red Parts,” i liked it a lot and i love the idea of reading them in conversation with under the bridge. i ended up downloading ‘under the bridge’ on kindle after i saw the first few screeners of the show ’cause i just knew i’d want to know more.
as someone who perpetually wants to know more when i see something based on a true story i feel like every time i pull up libby to read the book about the show i am watching it is always like a 45 week wait!!