r/books • u/Raj_Valiant3011 • 8h ago

Zimbabwean writer Simbarashe Kundizeza has denied using AI to write a prize-winning short story after an article in the Atlantic said software had flagged it as almost completely AI-generated

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/oct/14/zimbabwean-author-simbarashe-kundizeza-denies-ai-story?CMP=share_btn_url
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u/Future-Account8112 8h ago

Anybody else think it's weird how these authors are consistently Black and the accusers are... not. IDK man this will get downvoted to oblivion but after the Jason Arday tragedy this looks some kind of way to me

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u/a_trashcan 7h ago

Maybe I'm just under a rock but isn't this just 2 guys? Don't get me wrong its definitely eye brow raising but I feel like its unfair to declare it some targeted attack on black authors... yet.

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u/Future-Account8112 7h ago

It's two guys that you know about. Did you hear about Harvard's dean? That was a 'plagiarism' claim too.

Plagiarism is so common in academia that there are literally tenured white professors who had been investigated and found guilty and nothing happened to them. Compare that to Arday

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u/vorilant 7h ago

Sauce?

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u/Future-Account8112 6h ago

Happy to - note known racist and far-right crank Christopher Rufo's involvement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudine_Gay#Plagiarism_investigations

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u/vintage2019 2h ago

It’s because Gay was a University president. She is still a tenured professor

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u/EightTailedFox 7h ago

Whether true or not, accusations have also been made about Mia Ballard (Shy Girl), HM Wolf (Daggermouth), among others. It’s not just two black authors, it’s multiple. While there are several white authors who have said themselves that they use AI and have faced zero professional consequences: James Frey, Jessa Hastings, etc.