AI-generated interviews stir up anti-feminism attitudes in South Korea
- Published on November 19, 2025 at 09:59
- 2 min read
- By SHIM Kyu-Seok, AFP South Korea
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As South Korea grapples with an anti-feminism backlash, an AI-generated video was viewed hundreds of thousands of times in posts revering men for expressing misogynistic views in what they falsely claimed were genuine interviews conducted in the 1980s. The video was originally posted by an account that labelled it as created with the help of AI and contains multiple visual distortions indicative of synthetic content.
"Amazing men from the 1980s. This kind of thinking in 2025 will get them killed by women," reads Korean-language text superimposed on a Facebook video shared on November 12, 2025.
It appears to show multiple clips of reporters interviewing male guests at weddings, with the men responding to the questions with sexist comments.
One man says he looks for "loyalty" in a marriage partner as "today's women talk too much", while another says if his wife is ill she "better cook my meal before laying down".
A third man describes women as "flowers, as their scent fades when they get older", and a fourth asserts that he does not perform household tasks as "that is a woman's job" and that he would "lose face" if he did.
South Korea has long grappled with deep generational divides over gender equality, with surveys consistently showing sharp differences between younger men and women on feminism, workplace discrimination and compulsory military service (archived link).
Online spaces have become a major battleground in these debates, with misogynistic rhetoric and hostile reactions to feminist campaigns frequently going viral (archived link). Gender-motivated killings, spycam crimes and debates over the abolition of the Ministry of Gender Equality have further intensified public discussion (archived link).
Politicians have also been accused of exploiting gender tensions for electoral gain, contributing to a climate where gender issues are often framed in polarising, zero-sum terms (archived link).
The same video was also shared on TikTok and Instagram, with comments on the posts indicating that several users believed the footage represented genuine interviews from the 1980s.
"I envy these men. This should be normal, the world today is a mess," one user wrote.
Another said: "These men lived in a time when men were respected and dignified, before feminists took over social norms."
The interviews, however, were generated with the help of AI.
'Faux interview'
The falsely shared video is credited to "80re_tro", and a keyword search on Google led to an Instagram account of the same name that posted the video on November 11 (archived link).
The video is captioned with hashtags including "AI", "AI did it" and "Faux interview", which have been stripped away in reposted versions.
The account has posted several similar AI-generated videos simulating old interviews and text in the user's bio reads, "Past folks' voices heard again through AI".
A review of the falsely shared video also reveals several irregularities consistent with AI-generated content, such as unnatural movements and visual glitches.
In one scene, a bride's veil floats unnaturally in mid-air, bending as though it is detached from her movements. In another interview, the subject's hand appears to sink into or pass through his shirt.
A cameraman who briefly crosses the frame is rendered at an exaggerated height, and the tail lights of a car parked behind an interview subject appear distorted and misplaced.
AFP has previously debunked multiple AI-generated clips falsely presented as genuine footage depicting scenes relating to controversial social and political issues.
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