‘BLOCKADE’: The Right Is Using AI Content Scanners to Try to Supercharge Book Banning

Conservative parents’ advocacy groups have been experimenting with using commercially available artificial intelligence tools to help them flag more books they’ve deemed pornographic to be removed from public schools and libraries. Even though LLMs are notoriously error-prone, and the books in question aren’t pornographic, these groups continue to explore use cases for AI anyway.  One such experiment indicates a desire to accelerate content production of book reviews for conservative book-rating sites. BLOCKADE, which stands for “Blocking Lustful Overzealous Content, Keeping Away Depravity and Extremism,” relies on xAI or OpenAI API keys to generate book reports from PDF/ePUB files, basing the analysis on a set of parameters that are publicly available through the creator’s [Github page](https://github.com/SchoolingDelaware/B.L.O.C.K.A.D.E.-Book_Scanner/blob/main/BLOCKADE_Content_Scanner.py?ref=404media.co).  The program’s script includes a list of roughly 300 words, each assigned a severity score that contributes to an overall appropriateness score based on their own metrics. The script explicitly defines “educational inappropriateness” as “content offensive to conservative values,” while also asking the AI “not to include any additional text or explanation” for its decisions.  “If you want to classify content in this kind of context, maybe toxicity with offensive content, troublesome content—whoever it is it finds troublesome—asking for an explanation is super useful,” Jeremy Blackburn, associate professor of computer science and director of the Institute for AI and Society at Binghamton University, told *404 Media*.  Blackburn notes that there’s a lot of control relinquished to a chatbot as to what the definition of p********** or conservative values is. The definition is whatever the AI model has defined it as.  “There’s just a lot of responsibility being abdicated,” he added. “If you’re abdicating the responsibility with this kind of not sophisticated prompting strategy with no real thought into how to evaluate what comes out of these models.” Read more: [https://www.404media.co/blockade-the-right-is-using-ai-content-scanners-to-try-to-supercharge-book-banning/](https://www.404media.co/blockade-the-right-is-using-ai-content-scanners-to-try-to-supercharge-book-banning/)

Next version update will burn them in e-bonfires. Book burning for the 21st century fascist sensibility.

Just like the Nazis!

Another example of how low the literacy and critical-thinking skills are of the GOP zealots. Good luck using that AI scanning with the Bible.

I suppose just *reading* the suspected books is out of the question for these folks.

They are going to try to ban books on investing because they will find big words like diversification!

If conversion therapy cant be banned then i believe books cant be banned.