There’s nothing that irritates me more than someone using AI to make art. Actually, that’s not true; what’s worse is someone else praising it. I will die on the hill that using AI in creative spaces—spaces built by humans for self-expression, a core element of our humanity—is deeply ironic. It risks stripping away the very meaning that makes art matter.
People often justify it through convenience. Why struggle when a machine can produce something faster? But AI doesn’t create in the way humans do; it rearranges, it imitates, it feeds on human work and spits out a diluted version of it. At what point does that begin to resemble copying rather than creating?
Some argue that AI is simply a tool, useful for handling tedious parts of the process. AI can lower barriers to entry and help people experiment with creativity which is true to some extent but still can be argued against. Accessibility is not the same as expression. The “tedious” parts like the repetition, the frustration, and the gradual improvement are often where expression is shaped. They are what make the final result feel earned. Strip that away, and what’s left? You didn’t create anything but rather outsourced it instead. Something important is lost, even if the outcome looks polished.
And the thing is that increasingly, people use AI to perfect their art. To smooth out flaws and refine endlessly instead of just assisting. Even though I truly believe that those ‘imperfections’ are what makes art feel human. They reveal the intentions and the processes along with a certain individuality. In trying to eliminate them, we risk removing the very qualities that give art its character.
Your art has meaning because you give it meaning. When you hand that process to a machine, it raises an uncomfortable question: are we still expressing something ourselves, or are we stepping further away from it? You’re replacing your creativity instead of enhancing it. Convenience stops being a tool and starts becoming a substitute for thinking which honestly I think goes for AI in general.
Meanwhile, actual artists are paying the price. Genuine work is increasingly questioned or accused of being AI-generated even when it’s entirely their own. The line between human and machine-made art is becoming harder to trust, and this uncertainty undermines the value of authentic effort. The very idea of originality is being eroded in real time.
Part of the issue lies in how we frame art. People often treat art like a product instead of expression. Suddenly the conversation becomes about efficiency, output, and whether AI art is “good enough.” As if art belongs on an assembly line. As if creativity can be industrialized. But art was never meant to be efficient. Its value has always been in expression, not production. Money and prestige are just byproducts, never the point.
“My biggest concern is this: what happens when the primary human skill becomes prompting?”
And yet, there is a growing preference for immediacy. Many people would rather generate something instantly than spend time developing their ability to express themselves. Prompting a machine becomes easier than struggling to articulate something original. Over time, that shift may change not just how we create, but how we think.
This extends beyond art. Algorithms already shape what we read, watch, and listen to. Now they are beginning to shape what we create. The concern is not just about tools, but about how much agency we are willing to give up in exchange for convenience.
Supporters of AI often highlight its potential to expand creativity—to make art more accessible and to inspire new forms of expression. That may be true in theory, but let’s be really realistic here. Theory doesn’t survive contact with reality and especially not under capitalism. In practice, it becomes about scale, speed, and profit. Quantity over quality. Content over meaning. In that sense, AI exposes the ugliest side of capitalism. A system that will flood the world with fast, cheap, empty creations if it means higher output. But at the same time, it also reminds us what art fundamentally is: not just a result, but an act of intention. Something shaped by experience, effort, and perspective.
Machines can generate images, text, and music. But they do not experience, struggle, or intend. They do not attach meaning to what they produce. My biggest concern is this: what happens when the primary human skill becomes prompting? And worse—what happens when people don’t even know what to prompt, so they ask the machine that too? At that point, we are no longer creating, or even directing. We are just… there.
We are already technically seeing it with declining attention spans, reduced willingness to learn, and a growing dependence on shortcuts. We can afford to do the work ourselves but we are definitely becoming less willing to do so. It’s sold as a productivity tool. But productivity for what? It hasn’t made me better. It hasn’t made me sharper. If anything, it makes it easier to avoid thinking, to avoid trying. To settle. When effort becomes optional, skills risk fading—not out of necessity, but out of disuse. What kind of creators does that leave us with?
What remains will likely be preserved by those who continue to value the process, not just the outcome. Which leads to a simple but important question:
Why would anyone want to read a book that nobody wanted to write in the first place?
Writer: Mariyah Khan
