Defending my stance on AI (I'm not pro AI-slop!)
Because this argument has been going on in the comments on one of my recent posts, I want to make an actual post explaining my take on AI, because apparently nuance has died, been buried, dug back up, and then fed into a machine-learning model trained on the corpse of media literacy.
I also want to preface: this post is not me saying AI should be above criticism. It is not me defending the current state of AI, the companies behind it, the environmental impact, the stolen datasets, or the way it is being used to exploit and replace creatives. Please read my entire post if you wish to comment on it.
So, I am writing this because some of the comments and private messages I have received have gone far beyond disagreement. Some of them have been genuinely vile. Some of them have hurt me. Some of them have scared me. And I know this is the internet and I know people love to act like being online turns everyone into an abstract debate topic, but I need you to remember that there is a real person behind this screen.
You are allowed to disagree with me. You are allowed to criticize me. You are allowed to unfollow me. But I am not a corporation. I am not an AI company, or a tech billionaire trying to replace artists from my evil underground bunker. I am a person trying to explain a complicated opinion as honestly as I can.
So please read this as what it is: me clarifying my position because I think nuance matters, and because I do not think anyone deserves to be dehumanized for trying to talk about that nuance.
Let me be very clear: I hate unethical AI use!!!!
AI art that rips from artists
people using AI to write books, posts, essays, scripts, poems, or whatever else and then passing it off as their own work.
companies using AI as an excuse to replace, underpay, or exploit actual human beings.
that creative labour is being treated like an inconvenience to automate away instead of a deeply human thing worth protecting.
I genuinely wish I could be fully anti-AI. Because most people who use AI do use it unethically, or lazily, or in ways that make me want to walk directly into the sea. The other day, I hung out with a close friend of mine who casually bragged about making AI music, and I genuinely saw red, like: “are you hearing yourself right now?” way. I do not support that.
And HERE is where people seem to lose me/misinterpret my opinion, because they hear me say, “I’m not completely anti-AI,” and immediately translate that into, “I love AI-generated slop and want artists to be unemployed” oooor “so you hate Earth.” Which is not what I’m saying.
I do not think AI as a technology is inherently evil. I think the current systems around it are often unethical. I think the companies behind it are often greedy, exploitative, and wildly careless. I think the way people use it can be insulting, damaging, and embarrassing. But I also think there is a difference between “this technology is being used in horrifying ways” and “every single possible use of this technology is morally identical.”
I’ve met with so many cool people; engineers, scholars, and media professionals doing genuinely interesting things with AI. People using it to solve complex problems, streamline tedious processes, assist with research, improve accessibility and support human work rather than replace it.
I think this distinction matters, because “make this creative thing for me so I don’t have to learn, think, practice, or pay someone” is not the same as “help me organize the thing I am already making.” Those are different sentences. Spiritually, ethically, creatively, they are not standing in the same room.
I use AI for many reasons, and mainly because it has been genuinely life-changing for my ADHD. I don’t mean to use that as an excuse like “oh I’m so neurodivergent and helpless owo!”
My brain is 24/7 like a room where someone has opened every drawer, dumped the contents onto the floor, turned off the lights, and then asked me to find one specific receipt from 2017. I know the thoughts are there, I know the ideas are there, I know the structure is somewhere underneath the pile. I can sense them, but sometimes I cannot reach them on my own. AI helps me sort through that mess.
It helps me organize my thoughts when my brain is in chaos. It helps me ask questions I’m embarrassed to ask. It helps me understand terms I’m struggling with. It helps me research tags or concepts when I don’t know where to start. It helps me format my own plot outlines so they’re actually legible for MYSELF AKA THE ONE WHO NEEDS TO KNOW THE MATERIAL. It helps me get constructive criticism on my own private work so I can improve it.
That is not the same as asking it to create the work for me. I still have to write the story. I still have to make the decisions. I still have to develop the characters, the themes, the prose, the emotional core. I still have to sit there and do the work. AI does not make me a writer. Writing makes me a writer. Thinking makes me a writer. Caring about the work makes me a writer. At the same time, I’m not going to pretend that having a tool that helps me untangle my brain enough to actually access those things hasn’t helped me.
I think that, maybe, that’s the part people don’t want to engage with because it complicates the argument. I understand that even ‘ethical’ personal use is still tangled up in unethical systems. My use doesn’t exist in a vacuum. However, I believe there is a meaningful difference between harm reduction and active creative replacement.
It is much easier to say “AI bad” and stop there, and I understand why. Because so much of AI is bad. So much of it is being used in ways that are disgusting and shoved into places it does not belong.
But refusing to acknowledge nuance doesn’t make the criticism stronger. Because then you end up treating a disabled person using AI to organize their own thoughts the same as a company firing illustrators so they can generate six-fingered promotional art for free.
These things are not morally equivalent just because they involve the same broad technology. A knife can be used to cook dinner or hurt someone. That does not mean every person holding a knife is committing the same act. And before anyone starts, no, this is not me saying “AI is just a neutral tool and therefore no criticism is valid.” Technology is never completely separate from the systems that create it. Tools have politics. Tools have consequences. Tools are shaped by money, power, access, and exploitation.
But how something is used still matters. Context matters, intent matters, impact matters. And yes, the environmental impact is a valid criticism. So are stolen datasets. So is worker replacement. So is corporate greed. So is the way people are using AI to flood the internet with meaningless content until everything starts to feel like it was written by a vacuum cleaner pretending to have a soul.
The water usage criticism is fair. The energy criticism is fair. The environmental cost of AI is not something I want to dismiss, minimize, or hand-wave away because it makes my argument more convenient. I do not want to encourage excessive AI use. I do not want people using it for every thought, every sentence, every minor inconvenience, every half-second of boredom. I do not think “AI helped me” should automatically become “therefore all AI use is fine.”
But I also need people to understand that I am not asking you to worship at the altar of ChatGPT. I am asking you not to villainize me as a person when you do not know me, my life, my brain, my intentions, or the way I actually use it. Have I used AI in ways I technically could have done another way? Yes. I’m sure I have. Someone might read that I used AI to ask for common Tumblr tags on writeblr and think, “Just go on Tumblr and compile them yourself.”
And maybe you’re right, maybe I could have done that. Or maybe spending hours scrolling, opening posts, checking tags, getting distracted, spiraling, and using my laptop and phone the entire time would have been less efficient and possibly not even meaningfully better from an environmental standpoint than one AI request. Or maybe the environmental calculation is not as simple as people want it to be.
I’m not claiming one AI request is automatically better. I’m saying most of us are not doing a full moral audit of every digital action we take, and pretending this one thing is uniquely simple feels dishonest.
The thing is, I am allowed to criticize myself too for not being a perfectly moral person. I am allowed to say, “Maybe I could be more mindful.” I am allowed to say, “Maybe I should use it less.” I am allowed to say, “Maybe there are times when I reach for it because it is easier, not because it is necessary.”
But that still does not make me the same as someone generating AI music and bragging about it. It does not make me the same as someone stealing an artist’s style. It does not make me the same as a company replacing a writer. It does not make me the same as someone flooding the internet with hollow, automated garbage and calling it creativity.
We should talk about all of that. We should be angry about all of that. I am angry about all of that. But acting like every single use of AI is morally identical is not activism. It is not media literacy. It is not critical thinking. It is just flattening a complicated issue into something easier to yell about.
And I understand why people are protective. I am protective too. I care about artists. I care about writers. I care about musicians. I care about the fact that human creativity is being devalued in real time. I care that people are looking at HUMAN art, made with actual lived experience, and going, “But can I get this faster and cheaper?” That makes me furious.
Criticize AI slop. Please. Criticize unethical use. Loudly. Criticize the companies. Relentlessly. Criticize the people using it to steal, replace, plagiarize, and devalue human work. I am with you.
Curate your space. Protect your peace. Follow people whose values and boundaries align with yours. If my position on this makes you uncomfortable, or if you do not want to engage with this kind of nuance, you are allowed to leave. I would rather someone unfollow me than stay here building a version of me in their head that they hate.
I am not going to flatten my own lived experience just to make my opinion easier to categorize, but let me clarify:
I am not pro-replacing creatives.
I am not pro-corporate exploitation.
I am not pro-using AI for everything just because you can.
I also feel like I have a responsibility here because I know I have a large following on this blog. I don’t want to be careless with the way I talk about this, and I don’t want anyone to walk away from my post thinking I am encouraging people to use AI thoughtlessly, excessively, or as a replacement for human creativity. That is not the message I want to spread. If anything, I want to be more careful because people do listen to what I say here, and I think that means I have to be honest about the nuance without pretending the harm does not exist.
I’m not dumb, I know intent does not erase impact. That is why I think AI use should be limited, transparent where relevant, and criticized when it crosses ethical lines. I’m not saying ‘my intentions are good, so no one can criticize me.’ I’m saying criticism should still be specific and proportional.
I’ve turned my asks off for the moment because I don’t have the mental fortitude to withstand harassment and verbal abuse. I understand that AI is an emotional topic, and I understand why people are angry. But anger at a system does not give you permission to dehumanize individual people. Criticise my argument if you want. Disagree with me. Unfollow me. But calling me names or sending vile, threatening messages is not activism.
Sorry for the long, rambling, sometimes repetitive post, but I’ve been thinking about this for many days in a row now, and felt I had to speak on it.
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