There Are No Girls on the Internet - Diddy Disinfo: How Creators are Using AI to Hijack the Trial for Clicks

Episode Date: May 27, 2025

The Diddy trial isn’t just playing out in court—it’s being weaponized online. In this episode, Bridget exposes how content creators and AI-generated narratives are distorting facts, feeding conspiracies, reinforcing stereotypes, and turning real allegations into viral fan fiction clickbait.  This isn’t just about Diddy. It’s about the future of truth online.   Thanks for listening! Please help us grow by sharing the podcast with a friend.  Let us know what you think via email at [e-mail] ! Follow us on Social: IG@BridgetMarieInDC; TikTok@BridgetMarieInDC; YT@ThereAreNoGirlsOnTheInternetSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Hey, it's a Shanti Plummer from Fudd around and Find out. This week, Azee Fud and I sat down with Step and Curry. Step talks pressure, confidence, and would it really? takes to stay great. There's different categories, I guess, so I'm like conditioning, shooting drills where you try to simulate kind of games. Look at her face. We have a love-hate relationship with those

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on the Internet. So I have to start with a quick heads up because this episode will deal with some pretty rough stuff, sexual and physical violence. Because today, we're talking about the trial of music mogul Sean P. Diddy Combs. Now, this trial has been a long time coming. If you're familiar with the music group Danity Kane, which was formed on MTV's Making the Band Reality Show in 2005, which Combs signed to his record label, Bad Boy Records, then you've probably heard rumors about Sean Diddy Combs for a while. And honestly, the women of Dandy Cain were kind of treated like crazy liars when they spoke off about Diddy. But now, those same women are speaking up in a courtroom, giving testimony for the state's case against him.

It's important to know that Sean Combs is more than just a musician. He's one of the most powerful figures in Hollywood, and its influence reaches far beyond just entertainment, from media and politics to tech. Combs really does sit at the crossroads of power. Take Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter. Combs was one of his investors, and when questions started swirling about how the platform handled things like racial slurs, Elon Musk tried to ease concerns by pointing to his personal friendship with Diddy, saying, quote, Puff's a good friend of mine, we text a lot.

So what's unfolding with Sean Combs right now is not just another celebrity story. It's a story about power, who holds it, how it's protected, and how social media can be used not just to share. the narrative, but how it's also used to reinforce harmful attitudes and tropes that silence victims and shield the elite. Now, as soon as I saw that Diddy was arrested back in 2024, I knew it was going to be a storm of disinformation, gendered tropes, and half-truths online. I've actually been following some of how it's played out online since then, so now seems like a great opportunity to get into all of it. So I'll give a little bit of an overview of the charges against Combs,

some highlights from the trial, which is ongoing, then digging into some of some of the of the narratives I've seen online and what it all means about power, celebrity, and our current online culture. So here's the basics of the charges against Sean Diddy Combs. Combs is facing two different sets of charges, civil charges from mostly women, but some men who are accusing him of a wide range of sexual crimes, and five criminal counts, one count of racketeering conspiracy, two counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion, and two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution. Those five criminal charges are what this trial is about. Basically, the government says that Sean Combs used his business enterprise to conduct a criminal sex trafficking

and kidnapping ring, and that he used his money, celebrity, and power to intimidate victims and cover up the crimes. Now, I have to say, I have been really disappointed in how I've seen some folks talk about this. They're talking about his actions as like sex parties, which he called, quote, freak-offs. And I want to be super clear. Combs is not facing charges of being freaky or having freaky sex or freaky sex parties. And everybody knows that real freaky people create a culture of consent. What he is being accused of is being the ring leader of a massive criminal enterprise that included subjecting people to a pattern of physical and sexual abuse. This is according to federal prosecutors. Investinators allege that over a span of

years, Combs would ply victims with drugs and resort to violence and intimidation during days-long sex sessions. He did not do these things alone, according to prosecutors, although right now, no one else has been criminally charged in the case. Combs allegedly had assistance, managers, and security staff who made sure that women and male sex workers were present during these freak-off events, and that hotel rooms where they were staged were supplied with things like lubricant and baby oil. In fact, if there is one thing that you've probably heard about this case, even if you haven't been paying attention to it, is that investigators took thousands of bottles of baby oil out of Sean Combs's home after a raid that they say were used in

these sessions. This detail was publicized right after Did he's arrest last year, and this is kind of a common tactic of prosecutions, drop a salacious detail that's sure to make headlines. The criminal trial against Combs is ongoing, but here are a few key points from the trial so far. I'll focus on the testimony of four people in this summary, one of the victims at the heart of this whole situation, Cassie Ventura, rapper Kid Cuddy, who she briefly dated, Cassie's former friend Carrie Morgan and Cassie's mother. So Cassie Ventura is sort of the voice at the center of what's going on.

The R&B singer was in a personal and professional relationship with Sean Combs for over a decade. Her lawsuit was really the watershed suit that preceded all the other charges. In November of 2023, she filed a lawsuit against Combs alleging years of sexual, emotional, and physical abuse. The lawsuit also named Combs's businesses, Bad Boy Entertainment, Bad Boy Records, Epic Records, and Combs Enterprise. Just a day after filing, they ended up settling the trafficking, rape, and physical assault part of the case, out of court. They actually settled within

hours of Cassie filing, but her willingness to come forward really opened the floodgates for dozens of other lawsuits against Combs. The background of how they got involved with each other, I think is pretty telling. Cassie met Diddy when she was only 19 years old and he was 37. They started dating. And a year later, Cassie signed a deal with his record company, Bad Boy Entertainment, and released her first self-titled debut album. Now, if you know anything about R&B music, it has been a long time question of why Cassie's music career never really took off the way that it probably should have. You know, she put out one pretty successful album and then didn't put out another album for six years.

despite being in a creative and romantic partnership with one of the most powerful moguls in music. I remember there was this feeling in the space of like what is happening with Cassie's career, while her lawsuit really shed some light into what was going on. Her suit alleges that this was all happening at the very beginning of Combs' coercion and abuse,

which took over her life and included things like forcing her to take drugs, forcing her to be involved with male sex workers during these events, where participants would have sex for hours, while Combs would film her and frequent beatings. Her lawsuit stated that the beatings were often witnessed by Combs' staff, who were employees of Bad Boy Entertainment and Combs' as affiliated businesses. Now, we've actually seen evidence of some of this.

Earlier this year, CNN published footage of Combs attacking Cassie in a hotel lobby. Prosecutors alleged that there was a male sex worker still in their hotel room at the time of the surveillance video recording. Prosecutors in court also quoted text messages from Cassie talking about the bruises and the fat lip that she received as a result of the beating from Combs shown in this surveillance video. Now, initially, Combs denied all wrongdoing and implied that Cassie was just lying for money until the release of that surveillance footage, he initially was able to get that footage buried because he allegedly paid off the hotel security. After that footage was released, I guess there was no denying it, and did he settled with Cassie basically. within the day, but still legal pressure against a mountain. I have to be honest, Cassie's testimony in court over the last few days has been difficult to listen to. I should mention she's currently eight months pregnant, so she was giving all this testimony while like heavily pregnant. She described

numerous instances of physical and sexual violence by Combs, including being kicked, punched, and dragged. Combs's former assistant backs all of this up and his testimony to the court, telling the court that one notable incident occurred on a private jet in 2015, where Cassie screamed for help. She screamed, isn't anybody seeing this during an assault, but no one intervened. Cassie testified that Combs forced her into these drug-fueled sexual encounters with male sex workers, the freak-offs, as he called them, which Combs orchestrated and filmed. Now, I won't get into all the details here, but the stuff that she says happened during those events is really unpleasant.

and then he allegedly used these recordings to blackmail her and would threaten to release these videos if she did not follow his demands. She also talks about how he exerted a lot of control over her personal and professional life, including monitoring her communications and movements. She describes these very creepy instances where he would just appear unannounced at her locations, indicating that he was probably tracking her. So for a while, when Cassie and Combs briefly split, She had a short relationship with rapper Kid Cuddy, who also testified before the court.

Cuddy testified that in December of 2011, Combs allegedly broke into his L.A. home, and during that break-in, he unwrapped Christmas gifts and locked Cuddy's dog in a bathroom. A few weeks after this break-in, Cuddy's Porsche was destroyed by a Molotov cocktail explosion. He testified that he believes Combs was behind that attack. So after Cuddy's car was firebombed in January of 2012, which he blamed Combs for, he was like, I have to meet Combs in person and figure this out. He said they met in an L.A. hotel meeting room, and Combs was, quote, staring at the window with his hands behind his back like a Marvel supervillain. It was just him and I in the room. We discussed the whole story of how Cassie and I started to date and how it ended. His whole point was, you were with my girl, and I said,

she told me you were broken up and I took her word for it. He was calm and he offered me water twice. It was very off-putting. It was weird he was so calm. Cassie eventually came. I was upset to find that she was back with him. She pretty much explained that we fell in love and things just happened. Cassie said that she broke up with Cutty after Combs told her that, quote, he was going to hurt the both of us. I also want to include a little bit of testimony from a woman named Carrie Morgan, Cassie's former best friend. She said that Combs once choked her and hit her with a wooden coat hanger, trying to get her to reveal who Cassie was allegedly cheating with. This incident led to Combs having to pay her $30,000 for her to keep quiet and ultimately ended her almost 20-year friendship with Cassie.

She testified that Cassie told her that she thought that she was milking it and over-exaggerating. Her friend had basically had enough. She signed an NDA and her and Cassie never spoke again. I wanted to include her testimony because she really is an outside person with no real connection to this situation anymore. So when people try to say this is all some kind of a consult, against Combs, why would someone who hasn't spoken up for years is no longer connected to either party and adjust, as she puts it, wants to, quote, move on with her life, want to be

involved in a conspiracy to take down Sean Combs? I found the testimony of Cassie's mother, Regina, to be amongst the most heartbreaking other than the testimony from Cassie herself. Cassie's mom said that she was once forced to pay Combs $20,000. Essentially, she says that Combs was angry because Cassie was involved with Kid Cuddy. He's threatened to release Tate. of Cassie's involuntary participation with the male sex workers. Regina said that in 2011, Combs threatened Cassie via email after learning that her and Kid Cuddy were dating. In this email, which was read in the court, did he threaten to release two different sex tapes of Cassie, including one that will be released on Christmas Day?

He also threatened Cassie and Kid Cuddy saying that they would be physically harmed, although not by his hands. Cassie's mom said, quote, it was understood that he was going to need $20,000 to recoup money he had already spent on her because he was angry that she had had a relationship with Kid Cuddy. He was angry that he had spent money on her and that she was with another person. Cassie's mom and her husband said they had to take out a home equity loan to fulfill the payment that Combs allegedly demanded because it was really the only way they can get the money. Cassie's mom also photographed all of Cassie's injuries from Diddy, which were pretty significant.

So that's where things are at with this testimony as of recording this on May 23rd. All of those claims were made in court under oath. Those are just the facts of the situation. But, like most things these days, this is not only playing out on court. It's also playing out online. So I want to pivot to talk about how this conversation has been going down on the internet. So I have seen so many well-worn tropes about what is happening play out online. The first is the obvious, the gold digger trope.

This trope has already made a few appearances at the trial. Combs' lawyer said in his opening statement. So when you hear from the witnesses who testify here who will tell you they were victimized, ask yourself, what is their motive? For many of them, the answer is simple. Money. His lawyer referred to Cassie's civil suit as, quote, a money grab. And then the defense lawyer posed this question to the jury. How many millions of reasons does this witness swearing to tell the truth and nothing but the truth have to lie? But here's my thing. Cassie already settled her civil suit with Diddy. He settled within an hour.

So how could Cassie testifying as the state's witness in this criminal trial be about money? Another well-worn trope that I've seen a lot online is, why didn't she leave? She's an adult. She could have just left. This one is so baffling to me because we have actual video surveillance footage of exactly what happened when she tried to leave. When she left one of the sex event at a hotel, Combs followed her, physically attacked her, and physically dragged her back to his hotel room. So that's why she didn't leave.

He also tried to blow up Kid Cuddy's car when she left Combs for him. When she tried to leave, her mom had to put up her home as collateral to give $20,000 to a multimillionaire to keep him from releasing videos of her and humiliating sex acts. So all of that is why she couldn't leave.

I mean, anybody who knows anything about how abuse works would understand this, but especially under these kinds of circumstances. And this is such a common trope used against abused women that it feels like a cliche. Abusers use emotional manipulation to isolate and control their partners. Perversely, abuse can sometimes cause victims to feel even more connected to their abusers through the process of trauma bonding, which can happen when cycles of abuse are interspersed with moments of affection. Cassie basically says as much during the trial. She testified that at the

time when all of this stuff was going down, she still had a lot of complicated love for Combs because they have been in a relationship for over a decade. And obviously, that emotional rollercoaster of highs and can create really confusing emotional ties. Add with that, the fear of physical violence, which we saw and is not in dispute, or other forms of retribution, can keep victims of abuse trapped in relationships, which the testimony from Cassie and others certainly suggest was a big factor here. Let's take a quick break. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guide, not quite.

Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends, me and hilarious guests from Jim Gaffigan to Bob Odenkirk, to David Letterman, help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and headwriter, Streeter Seidel, help an acapella band with their between songs banter. There's the worst in the group. The worst?

Yeah. Me. Is there anything to the idea that because you're from Harvard, you only got in because your parents made a huge donation. The group. The yard birds, right? That's the name. The Harvard yard, but they're open to change.

Do you have a name suggestion? We're open. Since you guys are middle-aged, one erection. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Humor me. I need some jokes to make me seem funny. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting, think again. More Americans listen to podcasts than ad-supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora.

And as the number one podcaster, IHearts twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only IHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business. Think IHeart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Call 844-844-I-Hart to get started. That's 844-Ehart.

What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast Point Game is about defying the odds. like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game. His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows without Luca and Austin Reeves,

I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid. He has to guard Julius Randall. And then he has to give us every. everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense.

And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nass would get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He running up the court, licking his fingers, why he got the ball. Like, you go through a training camp with that, Isaiah. You figure it out real quick.

Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Deanna Maria Riva, actress, mother, lover, and a Gen X woman walking through life one hot flash and hormonal crying jag at a time. You ladies know what I mean. I'll bet you a perimenopausal chin here you do. So let's talk about it.

Join me on my new podcast. How hard can it be with Deanna Maria Riva, where I call on my Gen X squads from Ohio to Hollywood as we navigate midlife's most fantastic BS. All of a sudden, I'd had hanginess happening on my own. I was like, what the hell is that? was married when I had her, so I didn't even consider how empty that Ness was going to be. Mood swings, night sweats, fupas, sex drive. Wait, what sex? Dating at 45. How hard can it be?

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So we're talking about how all these well-worn tropes about survivors have been showing up in the trial against Sean Pidity Combs and how they continue to discredit people from speaking up. Another trope I've seen online is the idea that Cassie wanted this. She must have wanted this kind of behavior from Combs. Combs' legal team did a great job to portray her as a woman who, as they put it, made voluntary adult choices. They actually had Cassie read text messages that she had written to Combs in court, where she said things that maybe could be construed like she was into what was going on. But Cassie says at that point she was really just trying to placate him, and that it was really just words that she was typing.

She describes how she would have these big events or premieres coming up, and that she was just doing these things and pretending to go along with them just to try to keep him under control so that he wouldn't ruin and blow up more aspects of her life. And truly, can there really be any consent in a situation where both parties agree there is control, abuse, and coercion?

Okay, so another trip I've seen a lot online is that the people who are speaking out are rats, they're going against somebody just because they're rats. The rapper Young Thug essentially called Kid Cutty a snitch for testifying at all. But let's be real. Combs broke into his house, and blew up his car.

And Kid Cuddy stayed silent about it for 10 years until he was subpoenaed by the feds to testify. So this is not someone who was just like out looking to sing like a canary against somebody who's wronged them. And by the way, if somebody blew up my car, you best believe I would tell anybody who would listen about it right away. A kind of shade of that trope that I've also seen online is that Cassie and the other people speaking out

are just trying to tear down a black man. And this one is the trope that. I would say bothers me the most because I think that there is a certain subsect of people for whom a powerful, visible black man will never be able to do anything wrong and should always be shielded from accountability, even if we have video evidence of him doing something wrong. And I think we see some version of this that comes out anytime a famous or visible black man is accused of a crime. Like we're all supposed to just stay silent and protects an abuser because he is a black man who is doing good in the community or, you know, trying to help his people

or whatever you want to say. And it just makes me wonder, like, why is it that this black man is more worthy of protection, but the black woman he abused isn't? And that the whole dynamic is that she's meant to stay silent so that he can continue to masquerade as a black man worth protecting. You know, this is all about power, coercion, and control. And honestly, to me, it's comparable to what we saw with Jeffrey Epstein. When I was covering Epstein for an earlier episode of There Are No Girls on the Internet, what really struck me was the way that Epstein intentionally ingratiated himself into the upper echelons of the tech world through things like his donations to MIT's Renaud Media Lab and other respected institutions. He did this with intention to shield

himself from accountability for his vast crimes. And this is a tried and true abuser tactic. Diddy was known for his iconic white party. which was a who's who of A-list celebrities and moguls. He donated to all the right causes. You know, he donated a million dollars to his alma mater and my old workplace, Howard University right here in D.C., basically trying to keep anybody from calling him out because, look at all these good things I have done.

Look at all these good causes I stand for. Even Diddy's attorney said in a statement, Sean Diddy Combs is a music icon, self-made entrepreneur, loving family man, and proven philanthropist, who has spent the last 30 years building an empire, adoring his children and working to uplift the black community. This is kind of a side note, but y'all might remember that Diddy's public persona kind of shifted in 2017

when he started asking people to call him Love instead of Diddy. He had a baby daughter in 2022. So, you know, how could he be a sex criminal? He has a daughter. He named his daughter, Love, which is also the title of his first solo studio album in 17 years, which came out in 2023. There's also this glowing New York Times puff piece that I think really helped him paint this new persona. I have to read a few gems of how the New York Times really helped launder this new reputation that he was trying to foster for himself.

He talks about therapy. He said, it probably most likely really saved my brain because when you have a genius brain, it is also a crazy brain. He talks about how he continued to try to understand life beyond the conventional earthly plane, saying, I'm a big old hippie, said Combs, who has attended multiple Burning Man festivals. I had a little bit of ego left in me, and when I did Toad, I officially had an ego death. Toad is the drug DMT, and it's honestly giving that joke. Men need to do psychedelics to have the same psychological revelation that most girls have had since they were 14. So basically, it's, I have done all these great things.

I am now a loving and centered family man. I could not also be a criminal. It's what Harvey Weinstein did. It's what Bill Cosby did. It's what Art Kelly did. And now it is what Diddy is doing. So this is what I hate, how there are real people who were hurt in this case. But of course, in our current digital media climate,

it just becomes another way to callously score political points in the ever-running culture war. So the reality is that Diddy, in building his public persona to protect him from accountability, is cozy with lots of famous people. Democrats, Republicans, other celebrities. When you look through the different pictures of who has been photographed with Diddy over the years, it's basically everyone. None of this should be surprising because it's, of course, intentional. You might recall that he had a voting initiative called Vote or Die.

He endorsed both Obama and Biden, which, of course, Fox News made a huge production about while glossing over his documented connections to Trump. This actually became a thing during the 2024 election, when right before the election, the account Trump Fact News posted a picture of Harris and Diddy, saying, never forget how Harris got her start. She's no stranger to Diddy parties in Los Angeles either.

So this is obviously a reference to the common lie hurled at Harris that she, quote, slept her way to the top. But the picture is not even of Harris and Diddy. It's of Harris and talk show host Montel Williams, who Kamala Harris actually did date 20 years ago. Montel Williams replied, Here they go again with all black people look alike. In September of 2024, a pro-Trump meme account

on X called The Right to Bear Memes posted a doctored version of a photo taken by Montel Williams in 2001 at a charity event. The picture is basically like they just put Sean Combs' head on Williams' body. It's like obviously a very bad Photoshop if you look at it for more than five seconds. But it prompted the comment, the Diddy Client list goes all the way to the top posted by Redpill USA, a major pro-Trump conspiracy account, and it was viewed over a million times. On Truth Social, Trump himself reposted, and then deleted, an image of Harris with Diddy's face photoshopped over Montel Williams's with the caption,

Kamala doing the Diddy? Madam Vice President, have you ever been involved or engaged in one of Puff Daddy's freak-offs? He did delete that, thankfully. But this was just the beginning of all the disinformation being spread about this case. More after a quick break. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, Not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Jim Gaffigan to Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman,

help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an Acapella band with their between songs banter. There's the worst singer in the group. The worst? Yeah. Me. Is there anything to the idea that because you're from Harvard,

you only got in because your parents made a huge donation. The yard herds, right? That's the name. The Harvard Yard. They're open. Do you have a name suggestion? We're open. Since you guys are middle aged, one erection.

Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Humor me. I need some jokes to make me seem funny. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting. Think again. More Americans listen to podcasts than ads supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, IHearts twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only IHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio.

Think podcasting can help your business. Think IHeart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Call 844-844-I-Hart to get started. That's 844-Ehart. What's up, fam? This Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano and our podcast Point Game is about defying the odds. Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game.

His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid. He has to guard Julius Randall. And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense.

And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nass would get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He running up the court, licking his fingers why he got the ball like, after you go through a training camp with that, Isaiah, you figure it out real quick.

Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, everyone. I'm Cheryl Stray, author of Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things. I'm excited to share that I have a new podcast called Mind Over Mountain. In each episode, I interview athletes, adventurers, and adrenaline seekers to discuss the inner landscapes and life experiences that informed and inspired their extraordinary feats.

I also bring a bit of advice into the mix, so we too can better understand how to face our own seemingly insurmountable challenges. Do you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to pull out what you already have inside. We're coming into this world, fighting for our lives. All I'm going to do is pull out what you already got inside. We're there to support and celebrate each other. And that's not like your story versus my story.

You're going to walk up and over that dang mountain. You're not just going to put your mind over it. Yep, yep, exactly. And if I can't walk up and over it, I'm going to go through it. Listen to Mind Over Mountain every Thursday on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's get right back into it. So this trial is not being shown on television.

If you're not physically at the trial or following the reporting of somebody who is, you might not have any real clue what is happening. So people online can and are saying just about anything to capitalize on the clicky engagement of this trial. Here's a few examples of what I mean. One rumor that I saw everywhere online while the trial was going on was the claim that prosecutors presented as evidence a secret recording of Prince exposing Combs' crimes. The rumor said that in Prince's final days alive, he filmed the video that said, if something happens to me, this recording needs to go to the press or the police, either one. This is simply false. Not true. Never happened.

And we've got to talk about this because typically I don't think it's good to amplify random conspiracy theories that pop up online because sometimes it ends up that you're just helping a random video that nobody was probably ever really going to see anyway, outside of these niche pockets of the internet, get more traction and oxygen. And a lot of times that's true. But I wanted to talk about this one involving prints because this particular conspiracy theory was not just staying in one niche corner of the internet. I've seen this particular false claim about prints all over the web, to the point where mainstream news outlets like Yahoo had to publish pieces debunking it because they were getting so much traction. And I think it reveals a lot about why this kind of AI generated,

conspiracy theory content works. They blow up something that has a grain of actual truth to it or something that fits an existing pattern or story that we already know or already align with and then project this entire fictional world onto it. So in 1993, Prince famously changed his name from Prince to the artist formerly known as Prince in a public dispute over how much control his record label, Warner Brothers,

had over his music. So the grain of truth there is that Prince was somebody who went up against powerful figures in the entertainment industry. So this particular false claim really does align with my existing worldview about Prince, which is why it works so well. And Prince died really suddenly. So of course, there will always be conspiracy surrounding his death. Like maybe he was killed by those very same powerful forces that he was trying to call out and dismantle.

So then, when you hear about the ways that Diddy, who actually is a powerful force at entertainment, used his power to abuse and control others, it makes sense why this is the AI conspiracy that really hits and takes off and gets traction. Because at its core, it has a great of truth to it, and it aligns with the kind of conspiracies that our brains love. You know, a story about a beloved figure being taken out by a powerful evil force he was trying to take down. In fact, I have to admit that when I was watching some of these Prince Diddy conspiracy videos for this episode, I found myself going from watching it critically to at a certain point, catching myself almost kind of getting lost in the story because the story is that good.

Like, I could see myself sharing this video, and if I wasn't already tuned in to accurate coverage of the trial, I might even believe this actually happened in the courtroom, even though it didn't, because it aligned so well with my pre-existing worldview. And honestly, that's what AI and LLMs are so good at, reflecting our own world's back at us. And it seems like that's why they were really able to hit a home run with this Prince Diddy AI conspiracy theories.

So where did this Diddy Prince video come from? Well, it came from a YouTube channel called What Is My Star Worth? Which posted the video, titled Prince's Secret Recording just shattered Diddy's trial. Then the video spread to Blue Sky, Facebook, threads, TikTok, X, and other places on YouTube. So I took a look at that channel and it is essentially very obviously AI-generated fan fiction that gets so many views. They have created video after video after video falsely linking the biggest celebrities to the Combs trial.

Most of the videos follow the same formula. They start with an AI-generated voice narrator saying, before we begin, viewer discretion is strongly advised. The following is for educational and entertainment purposes only. But then, in the very next sentence, the narrator says,

this is the verbatim federal courtroom testimony of the Sean Diddy Combs trial as reported by Inner City Press when, no, it's not. One video called Oprah Flux Diddy claims that Oprah was present at one of Diddy's hotel sex sessions and that the actress Monique has named Oprah, Tyler Perry, and others as being involved.

That video has only been up for four days and it already has 1.5 million views. And again, this is pure fiction. None of these people testified, none of these people are even involved in any of this. As somebody who studies conspiracy theories and how they move online, when I look at this page, I can sort of immediately clock what's going on. When you go back a little further in the content, before switching over to all-ditty content, the channel was sort of cycling through this format of having a public figure in some sort of sad situation. It's generally an AI-generated image of a sad-looking celebrity, and then it'll say, the shocking truth about Christopher Walken seemed to imply.

that like something bad is happening in his life. Now, their early videos seem to have done all right in terms of views, but the Diddy videos really hit, so of course they're going to keep producing them. And honestly, it seems like any celebrity you want, dead or alive, can be mixed up in the Diddy stuff. Elvis, Wendy Williams, Whitney Houston, Will Smith, according to this channel, have all appeared in the courtroom

to give explosive testimony. But like I said, it's just fan fiction. Except, in my opinion, they're obviously going out of their way to make it look real. And it's interesting how they pick celebrities that have some level of conspiracy theory kind of around them already, folks like Will Smith or Oprah. They pair that with an AI-generated image of that celebrity looking distraught on the stand next to an AI-generated ditty, and people actually believe it. I fully expected the comments on these videos to be people calling it out as obvious fakes,

but no, people believe it. In one of these AI-generated videos, they claim that Samuel L. Jackson took the stand and made a bombshell accusation, claiming that Diddy groomed Lori Harvey and that her stepfather, Steve Harvey, may have played a role in serving his stepdaughter up to be abused by Diddy. It says, the shocking testimony has sent shockwaves across the entertainment industry and social media, as the Harvey family's reputation is suddenly thrown into question. Now, there is a disclaimer at the very bottom that says this content is fictional and intended for entertainment purposes only, No verified court documents or official statements confirm these claims. But that doesn't stop people in the comments from talking about it like it's real. Here's a few comments.

I always had this instinctive feeling that something was wrong with Steve Harvey, Tyler, Perry, Oprah, Kevin Hart, Michael Jackson, T.D. Jakes, and Martin Lawrence and others. I never understood by folks on TV and movies may be uncomfortable. Learning this now, I know God gave me this wonderful gift. Here's another comment. Samuel is a noble brother that appreciates fair game and order. To see a colleague sacrificed his own daughter for gain with a demonic, cold, calculating monster is an insult to our entire culture. No man should be that thirsty to compromise his integrity for money. Steve pimped that girl.

Samuel is the one millions of us respect. And lastly, quote, how I wish I could have seen Mr. Jackson's testimony. This could be a movie. And I hate to break it to you, but you can't see Mr. Jackson's testimony because it doesn't exist. It never happened. So even when the coverage of the trial isn't straight up making up facts, It still feels gross. People online are covering this trial

at the recapping a Netflix series. Friend of the podcast, Francesca Ramsey, made a great point that creators online are rushing to do these breakdowns and coverage for engagement of all these salacious details that make it seem like they're covering a fictional series, not the traumas of somebody else's life.

It's a bit of a sad commentary on the state of our digital media ecosystem, which really does encourage everybody to have an opinion, everybody to have a take, but in doing so, treats real people's lives like stories and discourages empathy. And this kind of fanfiction capturing the nation's interest with this trial is not new. It started the day that Diddy was arrested.

Combs's late ex-wife, the model Kim Porter, died very suddenly in 2018. Her listed cause of death was pneumonia, but rumors have swirled about her death since she died. After Diddy was arrested, an L.A. base producer self-published a, quote, memoir of Kim Porter's on Amazon. The memoir was full of pulpy, salacious claims about Sean Combs' past and crimes. There were plenty of people breaking it down on TikTok, but this memoir is probably completely bogus. The author, who calls himself Chris Todd, no relation, told Vanity Fair that the memoir is based

on a flash drive that Kim Porter allegedly left behind after her death in 2018, which also contained, he claims, quote, tapes of Diddy with celebrities in sexual situations. He said that he received portions of the drive from a, quote, celebrity source who was, quote, very close inside the Kim and Diddy hip-hop circle. In the variety interview, Todd said, I'm not doing this for the money. I'm the voice for the voiceless, although he did acknowledge making a fair bit of money from the fake book. He even told Rolling Stone that he himself can't be short that memoir is real, saying, if somebody put my feet to the fire and they said, life or death, is this book real? I have to say, I don't know. But it's real enough to me.

Sometimes you just got to put it out there. Maybe not 100% of the book is true, but maybe 80% is. That is to get those people to come forward and either corroborate or deny the claims, and that helps me as an investigator to know the truth. So even though the person who published this memoir pretty much says it's probably not true, this did not stop the book from shooting to the number one spot on Amazon. Eventually, in October 24, after shooting, to the number one spot, Amazon pulled it. And that really says a lot to me, that we have a digital culture

that really incentivizes just making stuff up about something as serious as sex trafficking and sexual abuse to make a quick buck, whether through sales of bogus memoirs or through online engagement through AI-generated fan fiction. That has no grounding in reality. So what's next for Diddy?

Well, the trial continues, and according to Rolling Stone, Combs' team is already working on a pardon from Trump if he's convicted. Several longtime friends and allies of Combs have already begun making connections to the Trump team with hopes of laying the groundwork for a possible presidential pardon if Combs is found guilty on the charges. Per Rolling Stone, Combs's team is hoping to appeal to Trump by drawing a comparison between their shared stories. Two successful businessman allegedly targeted by federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York with baseless, wink-wink-awks' accusations of sexual assault.

Combs and Trump have reportedly maintained a friendly personal relationship for over a decade. Trump described Combs as, quote, a good friend of mine during a 2012 taping of celebrity apprentice and was a regular attendee at his birthday parties. And you know what? I think it might work. I think if Diddy is convicted, I could see a world where Trump pardons him. And I just want to end by saying, survivors are watching. That dig about Cassie being a gold digger or somehow inviting her own abuse?

Cassie probably won't see it online. But you know who will? Survivors. Survivors are watching and we're not going to stand for it. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi? You can reach us at hello at tangoody.com.

You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangoity.com. There are no girls on the internet was created by me, Bridget Todd. It's a production of IHeart Radio and unbossed creative. Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer.

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