A new slur is making the rounds, with a twist: "Clanker" is reserved for robots. As NBC News reports, the term saw a spike on Google Trends in June, thanks in part to a slew of TikTok videos using the term. In one of the more popular clips—see it here—people berate a wheeled delivery robot on the sidewalk. And it's spread well beyond TikTokkers, even to the halls of Congress. Rep. Ruben Gallego of Texas used the term in a tweet about legislation requiring actual humans to answer customer service calls. "My new bill makes sure you don't have to talk to a clanker if you don't want to," he wrote.
A piece at Gizmodo ties the rise of "clanker" to the increased use of generative artificial intelligence. "It's become an increasingly common derogatory term, growing beyond the constraints of referring to chatbots and image generators to refer to any kind of non-human robotic intelligence," writes James Whitbrook. As it turns out, the term has been around for awhile—and it hails from the Star Wars universe. Know Your Meme traces it to the 2005 video game Republic Commando, where it was used as a derogatory way to describe the way droids clanked when they moved.
It appears the term is now well on its way to entering the mainstream lexicon, though the NBC story adds a note of caution to those slamming AI with its use:
- "By using a slur in a way that would typically apply to a human, people are also elevating the technology, offering some sense that people both want to put down the machines and recognize their ascension in society."
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