My Stance on Generative AI
“I’m not anti-AI, but…”
Over the last few months, I’ve seen this opening line in hundreds of posts across LinkedIn, social media, and industry blogs. It’s usually followed by discussion of the many problems with so-called artificial intelligence (AI), and specifically generative AI, before the person hurriedly clarifies that they’re not anti-AI or anything!
I am anti-AI, and I think you should be, too.
A clarification, since I get asked this question quite regularly: Generative AI refers to platforms like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and so on—those that synthesise and generate new outputs, such as text or images, from their training data. Traditional AI instead “analyzes and interprets existing data to improve efficiency, accuracy, and decision-making within predefined boundaries” (Source: University of Illinois.)
My views, as discussed here and elsewhere, refer to generative AI specifically. I don’t know anywhere near as much about traditional AI, but the general consensus amongst experts is that it is significantly less harmful for a number of reasons: smaller datasets, lower energy and water use, and no unauthorised scraping of copyrighted works, amongst others.
All this to say: I am passionately opposed to generative AI.
Not in a “well, it has its limits but it’s a tool like any other…” way, but in a “this technology is fundamentally dangerous and destructive and it should never have been unleashed on the world” way.
This often surprises people. I have been called a Luddite and a dinosaur. (Which, honestly, is fine with me. The Luddites had a point and dinosaurs have been cool for approximately 240 million years.)
So why do I feel so strongly about this issue, and why am I unwilling to shut up about it?
Let’s talk about it.
Gen-AI Has a Devastating Human Cost
Many of the technology companies that are leading the gen-AI race rely on labour exploitation and human rights violations around the world, most notably in the global south.
This is because AI relies on several critical minerals which are often mined under horrendous conditions, causing tremendous damage to ecosystems and communities in the process.
Lithium mining in South America’s “Lithium Triangle” (encompassing parts of Chile, Argentina, and Bolivia) is depleting and polluting water reserves and violating the land rights of indigenous communities. Protestors have been met with repression and violence.
In the Democratic Republic of Congo, which is home to the world’s largest reserves of cobalt, tens of thousands of workers mine the mineral in life-threatening conditions. Many of them are children.
Gen-AI is Destroying the Planet
We are in a climate crisis, and generative AI is one of the worst things to happen to the planet in years. The data centres required to run tools like ChatGPT use staggering amounts of power and resources.
According to Dr Noman Bashir of MIT’s Climate and Sustainability Consortium:
“What is different about generative AI is the power density it requires. Fundamentally, it is just computing, but a generative AI training cluster might consume seven or eight times more energy than a typical computing workload”
In the same article, writer Adam Zewe explains that generative AI is partially responsible for the power consumption of North America’s data centres increasing from 2,688 megawatts at the end of 2022 to 5,341 megawatts at the end of 2023.
If data centres were a country, that country would be the 11th largest consumer of power in the world, sitting between Saudi Arabia and France.
Then there’s the water. Processing all that energy, cooling the massive servers that power generative AI models, and manufacturing the chips and other key components uses up fresh water at an extraordinary rate. According to UN University: “AI-related water consumption could equal the basic annual domestic needs of 1.3 billion people by the end of the decade.”
I hope I don’t have to spell this out: without enough clean water, humans die.
From the ways we travel to the food we eat, we all have an impact on our environment and the planet. I’m certainly far from a perfect environmentalist. However, I believe we all have a moral imperative to stay informed and make the sustainable changes we can. Boycotting generative AI is a step most people can take.
Gen-AI is Making Humans Less Intelligent
An increasing body of research is highlighting the devastating impact of generative AI on human intelligence, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving.
For example, a study by MIT Media Lab indicated that excessive reliance on AI “may inadvertently contribute to cognitive atrophy.” The results of a 2025 study by Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University suggested that “higher confidence in GenAI is associated with less critical thinking.”
What kind of harm will this do over the medium to long term? The simple answer is that we don’t know yet, but outsourcing our brains to (notoriously flawed) machines is unlikely to lead to anything good.
The name “artificial intelligence” is a misnomer. This technology cannot think. It cannot create. It is not intelligent. But we are.
The human mind is an incredible thing. Human creativity is magical, transformative, and irreplaceable. Let’s use it.
Gen-AI Exploits, Steals From, and Threatens the Livelihood of Creative Professionals
When ChatGPT first took the internet by storm in late 2022, I quipped to my partner that “well, I won’t have a job a year from now!”
Thankfully, five years on, this hasn’t been the case. It turns out that many people still see the benefit of human-created content, and my wonderful clients have been amongst them. However, the creative industries and many of the professionals who work in them are feeling the impacts of these technologies keenly.
Many people have lost jobs, lost freelance contracts, or had their hours cut in favour of AI.
Some of these people have already been hired back, and some experts predict many more will follow as bosses and clients realise the limitations of AI. However, by this point the damage is often already done. Even for those of us who have kept our jobs, the precarity of the creative industries feels closer to home than ever.
Even more insidiously, generative AI operates on content stolen from creative professionals.
Remember: AI is not real intelligence. It can’t think or create. All it can do is regurgitate versions of what it has been fed.
Instead, these models scrape content from all over the internet. This includes paywalled and copyrighted content. The writers, artists, photographers, musicians, and other creators who made that work in the first place? They are being neither consulted nor compensated. Their work is being used without their consent and without payment.
As John S. Knight Journalism Fellow David Carson says, this is not fair use. It is theft.
Finally, AI-Generated Content is Bad
Generative AI is free or extremely cheap. My work is neither of those things. So why, despite my initial fears, hasn’t AI stolen my job?
Simple: because AI-generated content is awful.
AI writing is formulaic, clunky and, well, robotic. There’s no heart, no soul, no contextual or emotional awareness. It reads like it was produced by a machine, because it was.
AI is also notoriously unreliable, often getting even the most basic facts wrong. Lawyers have been sanctioned for using AI to create court briefs, including at least one notable incident where ChatGPT hallucinated case law that does not exist. One of the most dangerous things to come out of the gen-AI boom is people treating these technologies as infallible, when nothing could be further from the truth. As the incredible AI ethicist and educator Catharina Doria says, “ChatGPT is not a valid source!”
The problem of poor-quality and unreliable gen-AI output is only going to get worse. Because AI simply regurgitates versions of existing material, it has already begun to cannibalise itself. Pretty soon, if we don’t change something, we’ll have AI models producing slop that was trained on slop that was… well, you see the problem here.
You Deserve Sparkle, Not Slop!
This has become my catchphrase and part of my elevator pitch at networking events, because I sincerely believe it.
As a writer, generative AI is an insult to my industry, my expertise, my skills, and the countless hours I have put into getting as good as I am. As a business owner or skilled professional, it is an insult to your vision and all the hard work you’ve put in to breathe life into it.
You deserve better.
Want to replace AI slop with content that sparkles? I create proudly AI-free words that have soul and get results. Drop me an email or book a free 15 minute initial consultation call and let’s talk about how I can bring your brand voice to life.