Vivienne’s Vogue Debut

It is August 2025 and Vogue dropped their latest issue featuring Anne Hathaway on the front cover. However, between the pages of this beloved magazine lies a figure so offputting, it has turned the modelling industry on its head. Within this issue, there stuns a beautiful woman for a Guess ad- appearing twice within the Vogue issue, but the controversy lies within her not being a real model. This is not the first time Vogue has used AI in one of their issues. However, they became the first ever magazine to include an AI model. In all honesty, I can only fear what this means for the future of the industry.

After reading this issue, I would be lying if I said that I didn't feel a deep pit in my stomach slowly forming. Feeling this growing uncertainty, this issue solidified my uneasy stance towards the use of AI in creative fields. As someone who has modeled before in Strike Miami’s 8th issue, it particularly aches that a magazine as influential as Vogue is choosing to incorporate AI over hiring a real model. I find myself asking, how is it possible for an industry, which relies so heavily on people, to have found a way to replace them? It’s disheartening to see an industry that I hold so dear, where thousands of people are working day and night to break into, stoop so low. It felt as though all their hard work and frustration was met with a slap in the face from an industry that has ultimately betrayed them.

I recall watching “13 Going on 30” and having a line particularly stand out to me as I consume myself with this topic. As younger Jenna is looking at Poise, she is comparing herself to the woman within the pages and her mother says, “Oh, those aren’t people, honey. Those are models.” Even before the time this film was made, beauty standards for women have been a constant uphill battle. Models have always been viewed as beyond human, something unachievable. When you mix the pressing issue of unrealistic beauty standards placed on women and the disguise of AI posing as humans, it will only intensify the already immense pressure women are being put under. Soon, models, the most beautiful women in the world, won’t even be enough in comparison to AI.

And I will not deny that I am incredibly biased on the topic, I simply cannot help it as someone who is trying to pursue a career in the creative industry. Perhaps I am so passionate about AI in the field because I am an artist, a writer, a filmmaker, a wannabe model, or because I am just a human.

Even if we ignore the thousands of creative jobs AI threatens to rob, we must keep in mind the pressing environmental harm that it undeniably causes. With AI consuming large amounts of drinking water, using massive amounts of energy, and relying on rare elements, its use poses an ever growing threat to our planet. With these factors coming into play, it just leads me into further confusion as to why we keep incorporating this harmful tool, especially when it could be completely avoidable in this specific industry.

I am well aware that AI tools make it more accessible for anyone to create, but it takes away, in my opinion, the most special part of the creative process: hardship. What reward could we possibly seek over a creation we simply fed into generative AI that steals from real artists? Creating art takes practice, skill, and dedication, all of which is stripped away through the use of AI. Generative AI is preventing you from improving and learning. Every piece of art that we interact with, whether it be music, film, paintings, literature, theater, dance, is the result of countless hours of trial and error. What could be more impactful than failing time and time again, and creating something successful in the end? I am scared because we are starting to lose that willingness to fail.

Once we strip humanity from art, we are faced with quantity over quality. We begin to hear insults that go along the lines of “this looks/sounds AI” because we know there is something about this tool that is undeniably soulless. Its mimicry of humanity cannot hide the fact that it doesn't contain the same raw emotions we have when we create. Eliminating intention, it removes what makes art strike a cord within each and every one of us. Overall, I must ask the question: At what point are we crossing an enormous ethical, moral, and environmental line for the sake of convenience and our ever growing laziness?

Strike Out,

Melanie Torres

Miami

Melanie Torres is a writer going into her second issue with Strike Magazine Miami. She is currently studying English at Florida International University with a passion for everything whimsical. In true Gemini fashion, she is fascinated with the world around her and can be found outside photosynthesizing on a warm day. If you're interested in finding her to talk about all things film, you can reach her through through Instagram @not.ur.m4nic.pixie

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