To the first, I say: Fine, I don't want to go where that bandwagon is headed.
"Left behind" is an interesting phrase, it indexes a notion of a race towards a desirable/shining "future" that only some can access, and which we should all hope to participate in.
But the TESCREAList/tech bro future is not one I want any part in and in fact one that I actively resist --- and I hope others will too.
>>
To the second, I say not accepting it isn't the same as denying that people are using the janky tech sold as "AI", some by choice, others because it is forced on them in their job.
Not accepting it means not normalizing it, refusing everywhere I can refuse, pushing for holding the companies producing this accountable with existing & new regulation, working to protect the environment & important social infrastruture.
>>
"It's already here, what do you mean you think you can refuse?" is just another variation of the agency-stealing inevitability narrative. The future is not yet written, and we can shape it, starting with rejecting inevitability and claiming our agency.
/fin
@emilymbender The 'inevitable' rethoric always reminds me of Thatcher's 'There is no alternative' (TINA).
@bluebabbler yes it does @emilymbender
@emilymbender Agreed :1000: I wrote an article about this! Not directly about, but also applicable to, and intersecting with, so-called "AI" technologies: https://www.privacyguides.org/articles/2025/06/17/you-can-say-no/
@Em0nM4stodon @emilymbender This might become my email signature line quote: "When we do not have enough time or energy to properly evaluate the consequences of data collection, our default response should always be no."
Oct 13, 2026, 8:05 PMReferring back to Mike Monteiro's @Monteiro wise words: "How to use NO as a complete sentence"
https://buttondown.com/monteiro/archive/how-to-use-no-as-a-complete-sentence/
I would add to that, don't feel guilty about giving fake information if there's no way to get what you want without it. Them not giving you a choice removes your obligation to deal honestly in return.
I've got a friend who's very against ad blockers because it removes the funding stream for that site, but my response is that if they would use ads tailored to the article subject instead of the reader ad blockers wouldn't work, the site would load faster and the ads would be just as if not more effective. So that is a choice the website made, and I'm making the choice to ignore their choice.
@emilymbender At the moment we are forced to use it on the job so it has an authoritarian inevitability but not a technical one.
Oct 13, 2026, 3:59 PMI think they are hoping to make the world's knowledge so turgid and unreadable that the only way to get any work done is to use their AI analysis.
@benh Which will also be turgid and unreadable, but also likely to be wrong in subtle (or even not-so-subtle) ways.
@benh I do have to wonder if this isn't their plan for software. Code quality is out the window now. No one cares if the codebase is a mess cause "whatever, Claude will be able to maintain it". Meanwhile the org is trying to crack down on token costs while simultaneously mandating we use it to write our code.
@emilymbender Amen🙏🏻
Oct 13, 2026, 4:27 PM@emilymbender Agreed. Also, one of the main characteristic about this tech is how it's supposed to simplify everything: you don't need to know how to code/write/draw etc, you just write a prompt. This is one of its main selling point. So, *if* we really get to a point where it becomes "inevitable", at least it will be easy to catch up. No point in hurrying up now.
@s427 @emilymbender exactly - there is no learning curve - I can jump on it at any time and be exactly where anyone else is - as long as I am able to express myself coherently and in detail.
@s427 @emilymbender I'm pretty sure it's at least a year since I was first told I'd be "unemployable in a year" if I didn't join the cult. Now I just walk around the office smiling gnomishly at people who are costing the company twice as much as they were last year and still not outperforming me.
Oct 13, 2026, 4:31 PM@emilymbender if you use a computer, it is very likely one is at least using the product of one of the stochastic extrusion machines.
I'm with you. wherever I can, I resist.
in circles I frequent, an increasing prevalence of "ethical" / "solidarity" "AI". inevitably, looking into 2nd- and 3rd-level funders/participants are tied to the big bads in the industry. it's open/ethical-washing a fundamentally fascist tech tree.
trying to keep an open mind, hopefully my brain doesn't fall out
Oct 13, 2026, 4:51 PM@emilymbender Same people using the same rhetoric they used to sell NFTs. Remember that. And remember how foolish the people look now who invested money in Bored Apes.
@emilymbender I can't help what's pre-installed on my computer & can't control how companies are processing my data, but I can decide to not knowingly invoke an AI myself
@emilymbender Beautifully put! Way better than I would have been able to! (And with significantly less profanity. Cudos!)
Oct 13, 2026, 7:17 PM@emilymbender My mum used to say this: if everybody is jumping off a bridge, do you just jump after them?
That's really all the reason needed to reject the AI hype.
Oct 13, 2026, 7:40 PM"The future is not yet written" is giving Sarah Connor vibes. 🫡
@emilymbender @bwana I think machine learning and the tools we can build with it are something that should be in the hands and under the direct control of everyone who wants to use them. We cannot allow a bunch of corporations to monopolise the technology. We need to stop the hyperscalers from buying up all the hardware and driving computer prices through the roof for everybody. There is a lot of open source AI software that runs locally on a regular PC, no Internet connection needed, no computing centre needed, but it does need decent GPUs and enough RAM, and those things are hard to obtain and cost an arm and a leg, no thanks to those hyperscalers.
@LordCaramac @bwana there's also the issue of how foundation models have been built, even the open-weights ones: the kind of hidden low-pay and psychologically damaging labour for censoring, and how the needed datasets have been collected in unclear or admittedly illegal ways. I would like to have an ethical assessment of professional (and even more, publicly funded) usage of such services and products, even before the legal assessment (see cloning the UX) settles down.
You can get religious exemption from using it in your job!
@mishandlingboners @emilymbender
The tech bros are claiming their stochastic parrots are conscious.
If that was true, then using "A.I." is participating in slavery.
I will claim legal, religious and moral exemptions from participating in a slavery industry founded on piracy.
@davidtheeviloverlord @emilymbender
Good on you man :3
Oct 14, 2026, 10:29 AM@emilymbender thank you for all the work you do on this. being so vocal in saying no and showing that we can do the same in our own small parts of the world.
I recently counter the "Left behind" heard with quick reflective "Well, I am staying behind, sure. Watching you walking toward the cliff".
Oct 13, 2026, 5:23 PM@ohir @emilymbender @Em0nM4stodon@infosec.exchange "Don't threaten me with a good time." is all you need to say to that left behind line.
“Left Behind”…sounds kinda End Timesy to me
@MedeaVanamonde deliberately so @emilymbender
@akamran @MedeaVanamonde @emilymbender Thought the exact same.
Fear sells. Doomsday sells more. There is no quicker way to get people on a bandwagon than to chase them and proffer the only means of escape to get away. (both perceived, not real) Fear is primordial and shuts down critical conscious thought. They need that to get people to run.
Luckily, for them, there is a lot of shit to be scared of, climate, pollution, drought, infrastructure, political schisms. Keep people too busy and tired to investigate these things; keep them unable to measure scope and contextualise, keep them unable to understand depth and repercussion... just get them to jump and react. The good thing, for them again, is that once on a path, humans are reticent to change. Groupthink, sunk cost, reinforced fear... those sheep follow quickly to the waiting gate.
The herd wants to reinforce their "correct" decision so they too join in the narrative of "don't get left behind."
“A strange game. The only winning move is not to play.”
-Joshua/WOPR, WarGames
Oct 13, 2026, 5:02 PMYeah, it's like the Christian telling of the rapture where if you aren't "saved by God" you'll get Left Behind. Of course AI to them is literally God so that tracks
Oct 13, 2026, 5:05 PM@MedeaVanamonde @emilymbender it's just a bad retelling of the book series by Tim LaHaye: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left_Behind
@emilymbender Winter has arrived in Gaza. We urgently need warm clothes, blankets, and tarpaulins to protect us from the cold and rain. 💔🥶👕🧣☂️
Any donation or share can make a difference. 🙏❤️ please please 😔 🙏 help me 📎 the link in the bio