OpenAI has banned the ability to make Martin Luther King Jr. deepfakes and other AI images and video after his daughter, Bernice King, asked people to stop using AI to create images of her late father.

“While there are strong free speech interests in depicting historical figures, OpenAI believes public figures and their families should ultimately have control over how their likeness is used,” the OpenAI said in statement posted on X. “Authorized representatives or estate owners can request that their likeness not be used in Sora cameos.”

Bernice King’s complaints about AI echoes the complaints of Robin Williams’ daughter Zelda

Bernice’s request came after Robin Williams’ daughter Zelda’s recent criticism of those sharing AI images of her late father, who died of suicide in 2014.

“If you’ve got any decency, just stop doing this to him and to me, to everyone even, full stop. It’s dumb, it’s a waste of time and energy, and believe me, it’s NOT what he’d want,” she wrote via her Instagram Stories, according to Variety. “To watch the legacies of real people be condensed down to ‘this vaguely looks and sounds like them so that’s enough’, just so other people can churn out horrible TikTok slop puppeteering them is maddening. You’re not making art, you’re making disgusting, over-processed hotdogs out of the lives of human beings, out of the history of art and music, and then shoving them down someone else’s throat hoping they’ll give you a little thumbs up and like it. Gross.” 

I concur concerning my father.
Please stop. #RobinWilliams #MLK #AI https://t.co/SImVIP30iN

— Be A King (@BerniceKing) October 7, 2025

She added, “And for the love of EVERY THING, stop calling it ‘the future,’ AI is just badly recycling and regurgitating the past to be re-consumed. You are taking in the Human Centipede of content, and from the very very end of the line, all while the folks at the front laugh and laugh, consume and consume.”

At that time, Bernice quoted Variety’s tweet featuring an article that reported Zelda’s complaints: “I concur concerning my father. Please stop. #RobinWilliams #MLK #AI,” she wrote.

Bernice King previously called out Sexxy Redd when she tweeted an AI photo on MLK Day

This isn’t the first time that Bernice has spoken out regarding folks using AI to creates images of her father. As Blavity reported, earlier this year, she called out Sexxy Redd for tweeting an AI picture of herself and the late civil rights icon on MLK Day.

“This is intentionally distasteful, dishonoring, and disrespectful to my family and my father, who is not here to respond himself because he was assassinated for working for your civil and human rights and to end war and poverty. Please delete,” Bernice wrote to the rapper after seeing the image.

Sexxy Red tweeted an apology to Bernice, writing, “You ain’t wrong, never meant to disrespect your family my apologies. Just resposted something I saw that I thought was innocent 🙏🏽.”

You ain’t wrong, never meant to disrespect your family my apologies. Just resposted something I saw that I thought was innocent 🙏🏾 https://t.co/3rGQreJNOT

— Sexyy Red (@SexyyRed314_) January 22, 2025

Judging by the comments under an Instagram post shared by The Shade Room, people are publicly backing Bernice.

“She’s right. Folks are doing too much. Imagine someone doing it to your family,” one person commented.

“Bernice just been tired of AI having MLK throwing up gang signs while C-Walking.. i feel her. 😢,” someone else wrote.

“The fact yall comfortable playing with the deceased let me know how desensitized we are to life and death,” a third person added.