Position: Universal Aesthetic Alignment Narrows Artistic Expression

arXiv:2512.11883v3 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Over-aligning image generation models to a generalized aesthetic preference conflicts with user intent, particularly when "anti-aesthetic" outputs are requested for artistic or critical purposes. This adherence prioritizes developer-centered values, compromising user autonomy and aesthetic pluralism. We test this bias by constructing a wide-spectrum aesthetics dataset and evaluating state-of-the-art generation and reward models. This posi