I've been seeing people say the harms of "AI" comes from shitty people, not the tech and that the shitty people will go away after the bubble pops. While the first part is true in the strictest sense (contrary to claims, these are not autonomous systems) it's not really true in a practical sense. The harms are designed in and the "shitty human beings" won't go away.
Generative models and automated decision-making systems are political projects. They are tools for fencing off sectors of our society for rent, for cutting back on education and healthcare for the poor, for removing accountability. They are inherently tools for removing humans from the equation. They are not neutral in their design. Their existence has a political purpose
@baldur This is not dissimilar to about a century's worth of outsourcing fiscal and economic decisions to technocrats in central banks and treasuries. That too was to remove accountability (no pun intended) and make part of policymaking less democratic in order to safeguard the capital order.