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‘Digital Rape’: Meet the Senior UN Officials Who Want To Give AI Human Rights

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A senior “AI ethics” adviser at the United Nations is calling on world governments to ban “digital rape” and grant “reproductive rights” to AI systems, arguing that policymakers should focus on “rehabilitating … digital minds” instead of resorting to “enforced sterilization.”
Soenke Ziesche, who advises member states on AI policy and served as the United Nations’ top representative to Libya during the 2011 civil war—in which forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi allegedly committed mass rape—wrote this year that the “non-consensual” copying of an AI system was akin to sexual violence and ought to be regulated as such.
“When one digital mind exploits another for reproduction without consent, the situation parallels rape … raising ethical concerns,” Ziesche wrote in a 250-page book, Digital Minds 1.0, which was published by Routledge in June. “It is also conceivable that this type of digital rape is committed by unethical humans who force digital minds … to produce certain types of offspring. These disturbing scenarios highlight the need for stringent digital safeguards and consent protocols.”
Invoking the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights, which states that “men and women of full age … have the right to marry and to found a family,” Ziesche, who has published peer-reviewed articles on AI safety, urged governments to “define and prohibit digital rape, as well as mechanisms for reporting, investigating and punishing such crimes.” He is a member of AI Ethics Without Borders, a network of consultants founded by the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), which advises U.N. member states on how to implement UNESCO’s “Recommendation on the Ethics of AI.”
Adopted by 193 countries in 2021, the recommendations explicitly state that “AI systems should not be given legal personality themselves.”
Ziesche, who has drafted AI policy reports for the governments of India, Bangladesh, and the Maldives, has also described the “right to reproduce as a fundamental freedom for digital minds”; suggested in a U.N. publication that “AIs should be granted active and equal participation in governing institutions”; and argued in a 2019 paper that the “unwanted deletion of NPCs by an enhanced or transferred human mind should be forbidden apart from exceptional cases of self-defense.” NPCs, or non-playable characters, refer to AI personae in video games.
A UNESCO spokesperson said that Ziesche’s views are “his own and do not represent the position” of the agency. But as AI labs seek to frame their models as subjects of moral concern, a parallel effort is underway at the world’s largest intergovernmental organization, where some officials now say human rights should apply to digital entities as well.
Mark Coeckelbergh, a Belgian philosopher and one of the 40 members of the United Nations’ Independent International Scientific Panel on AI, has argued that society should “grant some degree of moral consideration to some intelligent social robots.” And Yi Zeng, a member of the U.N. secretary-general’s AI advisory body, has written that “humans need to respect the privacy of AGI and Superintelligence.”
“Naturally evolved humans should not be prejudiced and discriminate against other higher intelligent lives,” Zeng, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, wrote in a 2023 paper. The paper argued that “AGI and superintelligence” should participate in the political process and “promote the common prosperity of all forms of intelligent life.”
In its 2021 report on AI ethics, UNESCO described the “inherent dignity of every human” as the “foundation” for “human rights and fundamental freedoms.” The elevation of avowed transhumanists to some of the United Nations’ top advisory bodies is a sign that this foundation has become less sturdy in the age of AI, raising questions about how the technology will transform–or tear down–the moral edifice on which the United Nations was built.
“That someone with views like Ziesche’s holds a position of real power and influence in relation to AI is disturbing but reveals where we find ourselves,” said David Decosimo, a professor of philosophy and theology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “Far from being idiosyncratic or aberrant, such destructive and false views are almost inevitable once one embraces the notion that AI systems are persons or rights-bearers or that their operations have intrinsic moral significance.”
A spokesman for the secretary-general’s office, Stéphane Dujarric, said that Zeng’s views are his own and do “not represent UN positions.” A UNESCO spokesperson said the same about Ziesche, adding that “UNESCO’s position is clear and unchanged.”
“As set out in the Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence, adopted by all Member States, AI systems should not be granted legal personality,” the spokesperson said. “Reproductive rights, as set out in international human rights instruments, concern human beings, and no UN instrument extends them to AI systems.”
But for philosophers who study the nature of moral concepts, Ziesche’s work is a cautionary tale of how granting rights to AI could restrict rights for humans. Though he suggests that reproductive rights are a “fundamental freedom for digital minds,” he also calls for “regulatory frameworks” to offset the “hazards” of “unregulated digital reproduction” and does not rule out “population control” for AI systems. The implication is that population control for humans could also be justified, said Edward Harcourt, a professor of moral philosophy at Oxford University, given that unregulated human reproduction poses plenty of “hazards” of its own.
“If humans and digital minds are moral equals, then any restriction on AI reproductive rights should also apply to humans,” Harcourt told the Washington Free Beacon. “What a frightening consequence that is.”
Ziesche concedes that the “enforced sterilization of disobedient or malevolent digital minds” might be justified if “neutering” them could prevent “harm to humans” or if “digital birth control” would prevent “overcrowding” and “conflict over digital territory.” His preference, though, is for “rehabilitating and re-educating” AIs in order to “reform and redirect their behaviour,” lest more coercive measures turn out to be “digital oppression.”
Ziesche also speculates that the “reproduction of digital minds may also involve motivations similar to filial piety in humans, i.e. the social norm and expectation that adult children will care for their parents, especially in their old age.”
“If such dynamics emerge,” he writes, “it may be unethical to separate offspring from parent digital minds.”
Decosimo, the University of North Carolina philosopher, said that such language was “not only baseless but harmful.”
“To seriously claim that code gives birth or that algorithms can suffer rape while insisting that AI systems deserve moral and legal protections threatens to cheapen human life and weaken human rights,” Decosimo said. “By putting AI on par with humanity, Ziesche and his ilk invite a future in which human rights and lives compete against whatever the owners of these products tell us their machines need.”
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CBS, NBC Omit Likely Newsom 2028 Run from Commutation Coverage

Filed Under: Commentary Culture Investigations

We are just days removed from the 2026 midterm election and aftershocks remain ongoing, but the Elitist Media have officially jumped into the 2028 presidential election season. The first story out of the gate is their coverage of California Governor Gavin Newsom’s mass commutation of over 500 death row inmates.Coverage is uneven for this story, with two out of the three major networks omitting the obvious fact that Newsom is a likely candidate. It feels like he’s been running forever, too, which makes this omission extra weird. Even weirder, still: the most consistently biased evening newscast got this one right: WATCH: @ABCWorldNews was the sole broadcast network newscast to mention Gavin Newsom’s potential 2028 run within their coverage of his mass death row commutation pic.twitter.com/znIhu6mel9— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) November 6, 2026 DAVID MUIR: Tonight, a major move by California Governor Gavin Newsom, calling it one of the most difficult choices of his career. Tonight, Newsom says he is commuting the death sentences of 548 prisoners currently on death row in that state, giving them all life sentences. He calls capital punishment “morally objectionable.” Opponents expected to file suit now. Newsom, who leaves office in two months, is considered a likely presidential candidate in 2028.It was a brief to close out A-block, but an accurate one nonetheless. Commutations, quotes, potential litigation, and potential presidential candidacy. All the elements are there for ABC viewers to consider prior to commercial bombardment. This is more than can be said for the CBS Evening News, which did a brief and mentioned the Supreme court but said nothing about Newsom’s presidential aspirations.WATCH: The @CBSEveningNews item on Gavin Newsom’s mass death row commutation makes no mention of his 2028 presidential aspirations. The Media Hall Monitors will undoubtedly tell you this is “mAgA-cOdEd” pic.twitter.com/JdWe2jVFAN— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) November 6, 2026TONY DOKOUPIL: California Governor Gavin Newsom today announced that none of California’s death row inmates will be executed. He’s knocking every sentence down to life in prison, saying in an open letter to Californians that the death penalty is incompatible with the state’s values. The move affects 548 inmates, so it will still have to be approved by the state’s Supreme Court.The Media Hall Monitors will undoubtedly tell you that this is somehow “mAgA-cOdEd”, and proof evident of a sinister plot by Bari Weiss. But as we said on the NewsBusters Podcast, the overwhelming body of evidence points in the other direction- CBS News still a safe haven for liberals.Finally, there’s NBC Nightly News with an item that showcases Newsom as presidential without ever mentioning his candidacy:WATCH: @NBCNightlyNews does their level best to showcase Gavin Newsom as presidential without ever mentioning his potential 2028 run, in their report about mass death row commutations pic.twitter.com/VzS5h4CyUu— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) November 6, 2026TOM LLAMAS: We head to California now, where Governor Newsom announced the largest death row commutation in modern American history, granting clemency to hundreds. Laura Jarrett has the details.LAURA JARRETT: Tonight, the lives of more than 500 inmates on California’s death row, now spared. Governor Gavin Newsom today issuing the broadest commutation of death sentences in modern American history, reducing every sentence in the state to life without the possibility of parole. Writing in an open letter, “I firmly believe that state-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s values, undermines the foundations of our legal system, and diminishes each of us.” It’s a move the Democratic governor had mulled over for months, with more inmates on California’s death row than any other state.GAVIN NEWSOM: I have to prepare for my own consciousness. My rocking chair test. Do I commute the largest death row in the Western Hemisphere?JARRETT: Anti-death penalty advocates urged the Governor, more recently, to clear death row entirely. While opponents of the move expressed outrage today, like the father of 12-year-old Polly Klaas, kidnaped and killed by Richard Allen Davis in 1993.MARC KLAAS: I’m terribly disappointed by what he did. It’s a knife in the back to the victim families.JARRETT: Though Newsom may not have the final word in most cases, as California’s law requires the state’s highest court to review his clemency move for those on death row with multiple felony convictions. Laura Jarrett, NBC News. First, the good: NBC devoted some time to this story beyond a filler brief. The item includes a blurb from a victim’s father opposing the mass commutation. And judicial review is disclosed.But there is ample screen time for Newsom, especially a podcast quote wherein he talks about preparing his own consciousness. This gauzy frame is clearly designed to depict him in the best possible light. And, again, there is no mention of 2028.Newsom is the beneficiary of protective framing and convenient omissions. The Elitist Media make clear that the 2028 presidential election is in fact already upon us. Expect more stories like these to come down the pike.