Title (not generated by AI)

Kiera McGuire 

Managing Editor

I’ve been staring at my computer screen for five hours now. I type a few sentences only to immediately delete them and return to square one. I haven’t experienced a writing block this severe in a while and am unsure of what to do. To most people, reading an opinion piece about writer’s block probably isn’t super interesting – we all have experienced periods of time where the words don’t flow as nicely and quickly as we would like. There isn’t a whole lot we can do about it in the moment. Or, that’s how it was in the past. Now, we can use artificial intelligence (AI) platforms and type in any prompt to get results. I can write anything with AI guiding me. This is why I refuse to use AI for anything, especially to help me write.

After I graduate from Wooster, I plan on going into film journalism. This will require lots of writing and opinion-forming, which I’m not afraid to admit is more difficult for me than writing an objective piece. However, part of the joy for me is coming up with my own words, forming my own opinions and articulating that clearly. If I use AI, I automatically feel that my own opinions are not expressed appropriately, and I don’t receive that same level of content and excitement I would if I were to write my own papers and discover my voice while writing. Would it be easier to type a prompt to a chatbot and somewhat formulate my opinions from what it spits out? Probably. Will I do that? Absolutely not.

There’s been a lot of discussion and debate about whether schools should teach the proper use of AI in a society where it’s already become so ingrained in academic life. I think that showing students how to use AI as a tool is important, so we don’t misuse the technology and cause even more issues than we already have, but requiring and strongly suggesting AI courses to students is a whole other issue I won’t go into. After learning about the basic functions of AI in one of my classes, I now know for certain that I don’t wish to use AI.

I’m not writing this to pretend to be morally superior to anyone. The basic fact of the matter is:  I wish to share my opinions on the increasing use of AI. As someone who wants to go into a creative field post-grad, I feel threatened, as do lots of others, by the advancement of AI. Will this technology take away the future I’ve dreamed of? Will it make my entire field obsolete? I’ve already seen the detrimental effects of firing local reporters and hiring people on the other side of the country to write local news articles. It’s terrible to think that all writers could be replaced by a technology that can find anything in seconds and report on it, even if it’s incorrect. I couldn’t tell you the number of times I’ve heard of AI giving people the wrong information, and instead of fact-checking, they assume that AI must be correct, because it’s advanced technology, right?

I’m over halfway finished with my time at the College. I’ve loved watching myself grow into the person I’ve become, and I’ve loved my time here, but I can’t help but wonder if all my studying and late nights will go to waste in a few years if I get turned down for a job because “AI wrote better than you.”