ChatGPT ‘pet-to-person’ trend: Imgaine animals, but as ‘white people’

A new social media trend has pet owners sharing photos of their cats and dogs, then asking ChatGPT to imagine what their furry friends would look like as humans. Most of the images created by the chatbot are adorable, funny, and surprisingly heartwarming. However, some users have called ChatGPT of being "racist" after noticing that some black cats and dogs were shown as white people in the AI-generated visuals.

It all started with a post shared on ChatGPT's official Instagram page. “Want to see what your pets would look like if they were a person? Making images in Chat is free and available to everyone. Just upload a photo and ask: Show me what my pet would look like as a human. Pro Tip: Feel free to add attributes you’d like to see or personality traits about your pet to get a really good one!” the company wrote.

The post also featured screengrab from multiple users who participated in the trend and shared their results on X. In three instances, black-furred pets were shown as white humans in the AI-generated images.

Here's how people react:

An individual posted, "Anyone else see the bias here?" Another added, "Fun, but of course, the black cat had to be a white person, lol. Little racially biased as usual." A third commented, "I don’t understand why the black cat wouldn’t be Black." A fourth wrote, “They made both a black and a white cat, both white people.”

A few days after the launch of the native image generator, social media was flooded with Ghibli-style visuals. The trend went viral as users realized they could use the chatbot to generate AI images inspired by the iconic style of Japan's Studio Ghibli.