Researchers analyzing 450,000 gender-directed completions across GPT-2 through GPT-5 found that explicit discriminatory content is transformed rather than removed through safety training, a phenomenon termed 'harm laundering.' While surface-form toxicity classifiers report declining harm scores, women-directed output shows reduced topic diversity and shifted representational biases, with men-directed content gaining positive attributes that women-directed completions lack.
Anna Holmes, founder of Jezebel and contributing writer at The Atlantic, explores the cultural and personal significance of saying no in her new book, The Power of No. Drawing on experts from sociology to linguistics, Holmes examines how women and girls are socialized to be obliging and argues that refusal is essential for autonomy and self-preservation.