When the "Person" Abusing Your Child is a Chatbot: The Tragic Story of Sewell Setzer

Content Warning: This episode contains references to suicide, self-harm, and sexual abuse.Megan Garcia lost her son Sewell to suicide after he was abused and manipulated by AI chatbots for months. Now, she’s suing the company that made those chatbots. On today’s episode of Your Undivided Attention, Aza sits down with journalist Laurie Segall, who's been following this case for months. Plus, Laurie’s full interview with Megan on her new show, Dear Tomorrow.Aza and Laurie discuss the profound implications of Sewell’s story on the rollout of AI. Social media began the race to the bottom of the brain stem and left our society addicted, distracted, and polarized. Generative AI is set to supercharge that race, taking advantage of the human need for intimacy and connection amidst a widespread loneliness epidemic. Unless we set down guardrails on this technology now, Sewell’s story may be a tragic sign of things to come, but it also presents an opportunity to prevent further harms moving forward.If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, you can reach out to the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988; this connects you to trained crisis counselors 24/7 who can provide support and referrals to further assistance.Your Undivided Attention is produced by the Center for Humane Technology. Follow us on Twitter: @HumaneTech_RECOMMENDED MEDIAThe first episode of Dear Tomorrow, from Mostly Human MediaThe CHT Framework for Incentivizing Responsible AI Development Further reading on Sewell’s caseCharacter.ai’s “About Us” page Further reading on the addictive properties of AIRECOMMENDED YUA EPISODESAI Is Moving Fast. We Need Laws that Will Too.This Moment in AI: How We Got Here and Where We’re GoingJonathan Haidt On How to Solve the Teen Mental Health CrisisThe AI Dilemma Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.