Victorian MP Georgie Purcell claims Nine doctored image to enlarge her breasts

Georgie Purcell says she has doubts over Channel 9’s explanation after the network blamed an artificial intelligence image-generator for shrinking her outfit and enlarging her breasts.

Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell has accused Nine Entertainment of Photoshopping her image to enlarge her breasts and expose her stomach.

A Victorian MP says she “doesn’t buy” Channel 9’s excuse that an artificial intelligence image-generator enlarged her breasts in a graphic that appeared in a nightly news bulletin.

Georgie Purcell said while she accepted an apology from the network’s boss, a day later she still had doubts about the explanation for the gaffe.

It comes after Adobe took issue with Channel 9’s blaming the “graphic error” on automation by Photoshop.

“I do have doubts around the reasoning, particularly with the experts, Adobe, coming out ... but I’ll leave commentary on that up to them,” she said on Wednesday morning.

“I just hope lessons are learned from it, by all media outlets.”

Ms Purcell called out Channel 9 for doctoring a photo of her to enlarge her breasts and expose her stomach.

The image of Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell was shown over the shoulder of newsreader Alicia Loxley during Monday night’s Nine News Melbourne bulletin.

The upper house politician had been in the news after voicing her anger at the state government’s decision to call another duck shooting season.

On Tuesday, Ms Purcell shared the image from Nine News and compared it with the original photo, which she said was taken in 2023.

Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell’s original image.

The image used by Nine News.

Ms Purcell said the photo used by Nine had clearly been Photoshopped to look as if she was wearing a crop top.

“Note the enlarged boobs and outfit to be made more revealing,” she wrote.

“Can’t imagine this happening to a male MP.

“What gives?”.

She pointed out that her stomach had been tattooed since 2020.

She also said the image had been edited to enlarge her breasts.

Nine News Melbourne director Hugh Nailon apologised to Ms Purcell for the “graphic error”.

“Our graphics department sourced an online image of Georgie to use in our story on duck hunting,” he said.

“As is common practice, the image was resized to fit our specs. During that process, the automation by Photoshop created an image that was not consistent with the original.

“This did not meet the high editorial standards we have and for that we apologise to Ms Purcell unreservedly.”

But Adobe said Nine’s claims were doubtful.

“Any changes to this image would have required human intervention and approval,” a spokesman for the software company said.

Ms Purcell said she accepted Channel 9’s apology, after they reached out to her and committed to investigate.

“I endured a lot yesterday (Monday), but having my body and outfit Photoshopped by the media wasn’t on my bingo card. It’s not abnormal for politicians to have catastrophic days at work. I’m not afraid to say yesterday (Monday) was the worst I’ve had so far,” she said.

“Unfortunately, the difference for women is that they also have to deal with the constant sexualisation and objectification that comes with having images leaked, distorted and AI generated.

“Let’s be clear — this is not something that happens to my male colleagues.

“The message this sends to young women and girls across Victoria is that even at the top of your field, your body is always up for grabs. And as expected this edited image has already been weaponised by shooters to spread hateful and violent messages.”

Ms Purcell said the “sexist editing” shouldn’t overshadow the work of female journalists.

“And it shouldn’t overshadow important issues like my continuous fight for a ban on duck shooting,” she said.

Ms Purcell has previously spoken about working as a stripper, which has led to vitriol on social media since being elected to parliament.