SVP Draws a Lot of Ridicule Online with Its AI Poster

Here's what it's all about

• The SVP is promoting its neutrality initiative on social media with an AI-generated poster.
• The picture showed a family dressed in what appeared to be traditional clothing against an idyllic mountain backdrop.
• Upon closer inspection, it becomes apparent that the clothing is modeled after traditional costumes from Bavaria or Austria. In addition, a flag featuring a fictional symbol can be seen.
• Users are mocking the illustration, while the SVP claims the alleged errors were intentional.

Summary created with

What better symbolizes “Swiss tradition” than a family dressed in traditional costumes against an idyllic mountain backdrop? The number of clichés that didn’t make it into the prompt used to generate this AI-generated image—which the SVP of the Canton of Zurich is using to promote its neutrality initiative—is likely relatively small.

Unfortunately, the attention to detail leaves something to be desired. Given that the conservative party is using this image to illustrate that national tradition fosters peace—as opposed to openness to the international community—some of the details seem rather unconventional.

An AI Fantasy from a Long-Established Swiss Family

The Zurich SVP had AI place representatives from three generations of a family in the idyllic mountain landscape: a grandfather, a father, and two children—a girl and a boy.

The fact that this is a family with traditional values is meant to be conveyed not only by the rural setting but also by their choice of clothing. Traditional costumes are in style; the girl is wearing a dirndl. In keeping with the conservatism on display, the little boy is proudly waving a flag.

But what kind of flag the little boy is carrying is a question that would probably stump even the AI software used to create the image. Because it stands for: nothing. The symbol depicted on it is entirely fictional.

Patriotic symbolism with no real-world basis

The men's traditional costumes are less fictional. That doesn't make them any less confusing, though, because they are much more reminiscent of the traditional costumes worn in Bavaria or Austria—leather pants and all.

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It didn't take long for the mockery to start online. "Now the right-wing populists are campaigning in Bavarian traditional costumes," writes one user, adding a laughing emoji. "If you're going to go for that 'Heidi' romance, maybe you should switch advertising agencies," writes another user.

A third commenter immediately got creative: He posted a new version of the image in which the family has been replaced by Native Americans. “I removed the Bavarians and added real Swiss people,” he wrote.

SVP Stands Behind AI Illustration

Despite the ridicule, the SVP stands by the image. Also on X, the party responded to a post by former Center Party leader Gerhard Pfister, who described the use of Bavarian traditional costumes “in a Swiss referendum campaign” as “the opposite of neutral”: “The image is intended to symbolize cross-border peace in the Alpine region. The clothing chosen is therefore deliberately Alpine in style and not meant to represent a specific regional or national traditional costume.”

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The party goes on to say that it is “telling that certain circles would rather discuss the clothing in an illustration than the actual message.” The statement does not explain why, in the same post, the party took the trouble to clarify the correct interpretation of the illustration—whose symbolism relies fundamentally on the clothing—when it should be evaluated independently of the “actual message.”