The New York Times recently profiled Scott Jacqmein, an actor from Dallas who sold his likeness to TikTok for $750 and a free trip to the Bay Area. He hasn’t landed any TV shows, movies, or commercials, but his AI-generated likeness has — a virtual version of Jacqmein is now “acting” in countless ads on TikTok. As the Times put it, Jacqmein “fields one or two texts a week from acquaintances and friends who are pretty sure they have seen him pitching a peculiar range of businesses on TikTok.”

Now, Jacqmein “has regrets.” But why? He consented to sell his likeness. His image isn’t being used illegally. He wanted to act, and now — at least digitally — he’s acting. His regrets seem less about ethics and more about economics.

The more perfect the imitation, the greater the lie. What people crave isn’t flawless illusion — it’s authenticity.

Times reporter Sapna Maheshwari suggests as much. Her story centers on the lack of royalties and legal protections for people like Jacqmein.

She also raises moral concerns, citing examples where digital avatars were used to promote objectionable products or deliver offensive messages. In one case, Jacqmein’s AI double pitched a “male performance supplement.” In another, a TikTok employee allegedly unleashed AI avatars reciting passages from Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.” TikTok removed the tool that made the videos possible after CNN brought the story to light.

When faces become property

These incidents blur into a larger problem — the same one raised by deepfakes. In recent months, digital impostors have mimicked public figures from Bishop Robert Barron to the pope. The Vatican itself has had to denounce fake homilies generated in the likeness of Leo XIV. Such fabrications can mislead, defame, or humiliate.

But the deepest problem with digital avatars isn’t that they deceive. It’s that they aren’t real.

Even if Jacqmein were paid handsomely and religious figures embraced synthetic preaching as legitimate evangelism, something about the whole enterprise would remain wrong. Selling one’s likeness is a transaction of the soul. It’s unsettling because it treats what’s uniquely human — voice, gesture, and presence — as property to be cloned and sold.

When a person licenses his “digital twin,” he doesn’t just part with data. He commodifies identity itself. The actor’s expressions, tone, and mannerisms become a bundle of intellectual property. Someone else owns them now.

That’s why audiences instinctively recoil at watching AI puppets masquerade and mimic people. Even if the illusion is technically impressive, it feels hollow. A digital replica can’t evoke the same moral or emotional response as a real human being.

Selling the soul

This isn’t a new theme in art or philosophy. In a classic “Simpsons” episode, Bart sells his soul to his pal Milhouse for $5 and soon feels hollow, haunted by nightmares, convinced he’s lost something essential. The joke carries a metaphysical truth: When we surrender what defines us as human — even symbolically — we suffer a real loss.

For those who believe in an immortal soul, as Jesuit philosopher Robert Spitzer argues in “Science at the Doorstep to God,” this loss is more than psychological. To sell one’s likeness is to treat the image of the divine within as a market commodity. The transaction might seem trivial — a harmless digital contract — but the symbolism runs deep.

Oscar Wilde captured this inversion of morality in “The Picture of Dorian Gray.” His protagonist stays eternally young while his portrait, the mirror of his soul, decays. In our digital age, the roles are reversed: The AI avatar remains young and flawless while the human model ages, forgotten and spiritually diminished.

Jacqmein can’t destroy his portrait. It’s contractually owned by someone else. If he wants to stop his digital self from hawking supplements or energy drinks, he’ll need lawyers — and he’ll probably lose. He’s condemned to watch his AI double enjoy a flourishing career while he struggles to pay rent. The scenario reads like a lost episode of “Black Mirror” — a man trapped in a parody of his own success. (In fact, “The Waldo Moment” and “Hang the DJ” come close to this.)

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Photo by imaginima via Getty Images

The moral exit

The conventional answer to this dilemma is regulation: copyright reforms, consent standards, watermarking requirements. But the real solution begins with refusal. Actors shouldn’t sell their avatars. Consumers shouldn’t support platforms that replace people with synthetic ghosts.

If TikTok and other media giants populate their feeds with digital clones, users should boycott them and demand “fair-trade human content.” Just as conscientious shoppers insist on buying ethically sourced goods, viewers should insist on art and advertising made by living, breathing humans.

Tech evangelists argue that AI avatars will soon become indistinguishable from the people they’re modeled on. But that misses the point. The more perfect the imitation, the greater the lie. What people crave isn’t flawless illusion — it’s authenticity. They want to see imperfection, effort, and presence. They want to see life.

If we surrender that, we’ll lose something far more valuable than any acting career or TikTok deal. We’ll lose the very thing that makes us human.