VOLUME VI, CHAPTER 2, SECTION 9
Stage, Radio, and Television: If It Is Fake, Say So Plainly
The last several sections kept talking about the school. This section moves the eye away from the school to a few other places: the stage, the radio, the television, and that little screen in everyone's hand today. What they do is also the work of handing down, also the business of culture. And more than that, they reach the widest crowd of all. Even the ones the school cannot reach, these places reach them. By the time of AI, this responsibility turns deadly serious, because AI can make a fake thing look exactly like the real one. The rule here is just one. Plain as day: if it’s fake, say so.
Why talk about these places? Because what they do is also the work of handing down, also the business of culture. And what they run reaches the widest crowd of all. They reach the ones the school can never reach.
Let me point one thing out to you, and you will see how much these places matter. This whole book is written for people who can read. You reach this page because you can read. But as the third section said, there is another great mass of people in this world who cannot read. They never went to school. They are called unlettered, the people at the very bottom. This book, they cannot see, and most of them will never open it in a lifetime. So this great mass who cannot see a book, how do they know the world? They watch, and they listen.
They watch the opera, watch the television, watch the videos on those little screens. They listen to the radio, listen to the storyteller, listen to the sounds coming out of those screens. A person who cannot read cannot read a newspaper, cannot read a book, but he knows if the man on the stage is loyal or bad. He knows if the voice on the radio speaks good or evil. He knows if the person on the television is weeping or laughing. This is the greatest skill of the stage, the radio, and the television: they turn no one away. Literate or illiterate, old or young, learned or unlettered, all of them understand, all of them follow. They are the only place in this world that can carry things all the way down to that great mass at the very bottom who can never see a book.
And so, their responsibility is enormous. Think about it. A person who cannot read spends his whole life knowing the world through these plays, these broadcasts, these screens. Whatever these things tell him is a good person or a bad person, what to honor and what to hate, what is real and what is false, that is what he believes. He has no other way to check it. He will not look it up in a book. He sees it, he hears it, and he takes it for real. So what these places pour into the hearts of that great mass matters enormously.
Pour in good things, loyalty, honor, honesty, doing right, tormenting no one, and that great mass who cannot read will follow these plays and broadcasts, soaking those good virtues into their hearts, bit by bit. The handing down from the third section reaches, through the stage and the screen, all the way to the very bottom. This is an enormous good. How many an unlettered elder learned how to be a human being from one old opera after another! But turn it around: if what is poured in is bad, if it is fake, that great mass has nowhere to check it. They take it all in, follow it, go bad with it, and get cheated by it. That is why the people in this line of work, the singers, the broadcasters, the station owners, the ones making content for those screens, carry the heaviest load. Because you face the people who trust you the most and have the least way to check you. Whatever you put in their hearts, they take. What you hold in your hand is the work of a conscience.
By the time of AI, why does this responsibility turn deadly serious? Because AI can now make fakes that look completely real.
In the old days, fake was fake. You could mostly tell. Painted on, acted out, shot on a built set, however close it looked, there was always a seam. A sharp eye knew: this is made up, this is acted. Now it is different. AI can make a video where the person looks exactly like a real human being. He talks, moves, weeps, and laughs. You stare at it for half a day and cannot tell it’s fake. AI can synthesize a voice, not a hair off from a real person's throat. It says things that person never said, but to your ear, it is simply him. AI can manufacture a news story, pictures, sound, names and all. It looks no different from a thing that really happened, yet from start to finish, it never happened. Fake things, made by AI, look exactly like the real thing.
This, in itself, is not necessarily bad. As the third section said, performance is culture too. Actors and filmmakers always did the job of playing out fakes for people to watch. What they play is fake, but everyone knows it is fake. You watch for the story, watch for the spectacle, watch the loyalty and evil inside. This is good. AI helping to make fake stories look more real and better to watch is a fine tool. The bad part starts when the fake looks too real, and nobody tells you it’s fake.
Think back to that great mass in the first part, the ones who cannot read, cannot see a book, who know the world entirely by watching and listening. In the old days, they could still tell fakes apart. On the stage, they knew it was a play. In评书, they knew it was a story. There was a line between the stage and the seats, inside the play and outside it. They could tell. But now, the fake made by AI looks identical to the real thing. A fake video, a fake voice, a fake news clip is put right in front of them. How do they tell? They can't. They never went to school. They won't go check. It would never even cross their minds that there is now a thing in this world that can copy reality without a single flaw. They see it, they hear it, and they take it for truth.
That is the deadly part. A learned person seeing a suspicious video keeps a corner of his mind on guard. He goes to check, to verify, to ask if AI made it. But that great mass at the very bottom has neither that mindset nor that skill. They are the ones in this world most easily fooled by a fake that looks real. And these fakes are delivered straight to their eyes through the very channels they trust most and cannot live without: television, radio, the little screen in their hand. See how cruel that is? The easiest to fool are the ones least able to check, the ones who trust these channels the most. When AI fakes set out to cheat, the first ones they hit are this great mass at the bottom, the most innocent, the most unguarded.
What will people use these fakes for? To cheat them out of money. To cheat them out of trust. To stir up their hatred, telling them this person or that group is evil when it is entirely made up, getting them to hate and riot along with it. In that thousand-year-old script from Volume I, stirring people up and sending them to war to slaughter each other relied on pouring false things into the hearts of people who had no way to check. AI making fakes look real grinds this weapon of incitement sharper than ever. So in the age of AI, the stage, the radio, the television, and those little screens carry a deadlier responsibility than ever before. In the old days, when false things were passed down, that crowd could still spot a few. Now, when false things are passed down, they cannot spot a thing. Whatever you say, they believe.
What do we do then? How do we keep this sharpened weapon from falling on the most innocent? The rule is just one. Plain as day: if it’s fake, say so. Tell people it is fake.
Anything made by AI, AI video, AI voice, AI pictures and stories, the moment it is brought to the stage, the radio, the television, or those little screens for people to watch and hear, it must carry one clear, plain sentence: This is fake. This is fiction. This was made by AI, not real life. Just this one line. Don't look down on it for being simple. The moment you mark this line, that sharpened weapon goes dull on the spot.
Why? Look back at section two. It was deadly because that great mass at the bottom couldn't tell true from false, so whatever they saw, they took for real. But the moment you label it clear and plain, this is fake, this is made by AI, that line that used to exist on the stage, the line AI erased, is drawn right back. They see the mark and they know: Ah, it’s fake. It’s made up. Just a show. Don't take it for real. Once they know it’s fake, they won't fall for it. The one trying to cheat their money can't cheat anymore. The one trying to steal their trust can't steal anymore. The one trying to stir up hatred and trouble can't stir them up anymore, because from the start, they knew it was fake. One line, this is fake, and the most innocent are guarded.
So make this an iron rule: anything made by AI that is put out for people to watch or hear must be clearly labeled as fictional, as made by AI. What if someone doesn't label it? What if someone takes an AI fake that looks completely real, doesn't label it, passes it off as real, and plays it to that great mass? Then what he is doing is spreading lies. Passing off fake as real to a crowd that cannot verify and will believe every word, what is that if not spreading lies? Making up a thing that never happened and making millions believe it; using a fake voice to make people think someone said words he never spoke; using a fake video to whip up the emotions of a crowd, this is the exact same as standing on the street telling lies to cheat people. And because AI makes it look so real and spreads it so far, it is ten thousand times worse than lying on the street. Say it flat out: using AI fakes to pose as reality, hiding the label to deceive the crowd that cannot read, that creator is committing a crime.
Get the position straight here. It connects directly with the rest of this book. The crime is not AI’s. AI is a tool. It was built to generate video and synthesize voice, there is no sin in that. A sharp knife can chop vegetables or hurt a person; the fault was never the knife's. The crime belongs to the person. It belongs to the creator who took AI, made the fake, deliberately left off the label, and took it to cheat the most innocent. He is the one who decided not to write that single line: this is fake. He is the one who aimed this sharp weapon at the crowd with the least defense. This tab is picked up by him. It is the exact same logic as before: the law-blind official who gave out AI compute licenses put a tool into a human seat, and the one held responsible was that official, not AI. It is no different here. The creator who uses AI to make fakes and cheat is the one who answers for the crime, not AI. The tool is innocent. It is the human who used the tool to harm people.
So set this rule down dead. Just two lines. First: anything made by AI that is shown or played to people must be clearly labeled: This is fiction. Made by AI. Label it, and everyone knows it’s fake. They watch for the story, watch for the fun, and that is fine. That is what performance is supposed to do, and AI making it look better makes it a good tool. Second: whoever hides the label, whoever passes fake off as real to deceive people, is spreading lies. That creator is committing a crime.
Who does this rule guard? It guards the very people this whole chapter has cared about from start to finish, the ones who cannot read this book, who know the world entirely by watching and listening, who trust the most and are fooled the easiest, the people at the very bottom. Look back at section three: you, who can read this book, must stand up, turn around, and help the ones who cannot see this book and cannot get up on their own. This rule is a wall built by you, built by this world, to guard them. So that the most innocent won't be cheated out of their money, corrupted in their hearts, or stirred up to hate and riot by AI fakes just because they can't tell true from false. Raise this wall, if it’s fake, say so, and this business of culture will hand down good things, real things, and live up to the great mass of people who trust it most.
The next section pulls this whole chapter together into the single hardest rule of all: The door where human beings are raised, AI is not allowed to enter.
Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.