The Public House’s continuation of last year’s Epic ‘This Is Not Us’ campaign for the Irish emigration museum now studies the prevalence of negative Irish stereotypes found in modern tech and popular culture, with a particular focus on artificial intelligence. The campaign runs across social, digital and out of home, with a heavy emphasis on Dublin Bus T-Sides and tour bus rears targeting visitors on the streets of Ireland’s capital.
Epic shows that the Irish have left a strong and positive impact on the world. The museum experience shares the stories of those who left Ireland’s shores, helping to influence and shape the world. Epic know that Irish people are more than just stereotypes – they are inventors, poets, designers, leaders and changemakers. Irish music, literature, culture, sport, food and dance attract millions of overseas visitors to our country each year.
Stereotypes
Following research, it was found that when you prompt the world’s most used artificial intelligence image generator, Chat GPT, to show you an Irish man, the results were, without exception, full of outdated stereotypes. The sad reality is that even though we have come a long way in the last number of decades, popular culture and tech still perpetuates negative stereotypes of the Irish, with ugly-looking men wearing leprechaun hats.
During the creative development for the campaign, a countless amount of these AI images were generated, with every result containing references to drinking, anger, aggression, ugliness, or leprechaun-like styling. While all bad, a selection of the most hideous images were selected to become the faces of the campaign – what Epic call the anti-hero images which most people in 2023 would have been consigned to history.
Ailish Carew, chief executive, Epic – The Emigration Museum, said that rather than exclusively taking aim at AI in the online film, the potential reasons for its negative portrayal of the Irish are explored, with references to the wider pop culture landscape of both the past and present day. The hero film creates a more immersive and comprehensive campaign, which mirrors the museum’s full account of who Irish people really are.
