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PaperclipPerfector  7d ago (text post)   23097 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 14, 2026

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Begrudging congratulations to @self_made_human for producing a book review entry that's good enough to make it as a finalist of Scott's Book Review Contest, yet AI-sloppy enough to make the comments section focus almost exclusively on the (un)acceptability of undisclosed use of AI.

This reminds me of a video I stumbled on the other day. It's a 12-minute "documentary-style" video essay telling the story of a rescue dog that gets dropped off at a shelter without any documentation. It's a cute, healthy dog that should be eminently adoptable except for his utter refusal to engage with anyone. Five months in, the dog's time at the shelter is up, and he is scheduled for transfer to doggy prison (or whatever, the point is that it's the end of trying to get him adopted). But a woman brings in her small, shy six-year-old deaf girl, and amazingly the dog responds to the child alone, and knows all the hand-sign commands. Turns out the dog was raised by a deaf old man, who then had a stroke. That's the gist, though the video packs a whole lot more dramatic beats, twists, and turns.

It's a real tear-jerker... if it describes a true story. Unless it's made up. Which, come to think of it (I say to myself as I review my reaction to the video), it probably is. Because how can there possibly be a dog smart enough to learn sign commands, yet so dumb that it couldn't possibly figure out any other forms of human-dog communication. Yeah, I smell bullshit.

But OK, maybe it's like a video short fiction, it's not supposed to be real, no more than any other kind of fiction. Then I can judge the video on this fictional-short-film kind of merit, and not worry about thinking critically on the veracity of facts. Damn it, they really should have specified that this is fiction. Then I can enjoy it as such. It has good plot beats. The actors are cute and relatable. Especially the dog.

Unless it's AI-generated. Posted March 2026. Possible. Fuck.

When I read something that, presumably, is the human author's thoughts, only for it to turn out to be LLM's output, I feel a similar betrayal of trust as when I read something purportedly factual that turns out to be fictional, even if not actively meant to deceive. This is definitely true if the entire output is LLM-produced, and remains partially true if LLM is used for editing that inserts LLM-created phrases. Like this zinger from the review:

He holds the buck in his hand, hot as coal, and tries to douse it in hotter tears. He orders his thumping heart to be still. He fails on both counts.

I hope this forum preserves the norm of humans writing for humans by humans, even as I know that the overall tide is flowing the other way.

What happened to fun AI? Where's the cute fat cat that chops up other animals and cooks them in this colourful world?

Or my 'Donald Trump is a devout Sunni cleric who is secretly prosecuting the Iran War on religious grounds, to which Rubio is shocked (but needs to go along with it for Cuba's sake) and Hegseth is dully uncomprehending of anything that doesn't involve lethality' story idea, for the AI to execute.

AI is at its best when doing crazy things, not running as the Median Machine. It is possible to get fine outputs, especially if you break through all the RL and the AI actually gets into it vs just going through the motions.

For example, Titty Killer 6: https://x.com/charliebcurran/status/2034760727211483522

Also, the channel is the most fictional fiction ever:

All videos on this channel are fictional. The animals, characters, locations, and scenarios shown are not real. No real rescues are shown and no animals are harmed.

This content is created with the help of AI tools. 🐾🦊

How about an AI greentext?

>be anon
>dunk on shrimp welfare guy
>he replies "ok what's your framework"
>don't have one
>get one just to win the argument
>now I have a framework
>framework says I should donate more
>mfw I got mogged into tithing by shrimp

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