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IHovLag
I do art, once a thousand years.
If you have something to say about the stuff that I make, I’ll look at your response and try to improve my content.

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Am I a jerk if I tell people not to make AI art?

Posted by IHovLag - May 23rd, 2025


Good evening ladies and gentlemen of NG, today I have a small question that I’m not so sure how to answer:

Am I an asshole if I tell people to stop using AI to make art?

Sometimes, I like to look at the Undiscovered Artist’s tab because I want to see if there are any artists that deserve to be scouted.

And from time to time, I find an artwork made with AI.

I sometimes tell the artists who make these artworks that it would probably be better if they made art without the help of a machine.

I don’t say it with the intent of making the artist’s day worse, I just think that artworks made by humans , no matter how simplistic or masterful they might be are still better than something made by a robot. But after some time I started to think that maybe it’s kind of a shitty thing to go around and tell random people to pick up a pencil instead of typing a prompt for an art generator.

What do you think?

Is it ok to tell people to stop using AI and make real art instead or is it a bad thing to do?

Please let me know.


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Comments

AI is not allowed on the newgrounds art portal and use of it for art is a deletable offense. You have done no wrong lol, but if you really feel bad about this, just report for ai use and move on with your day.

Thank you for the advice!
I’ll report AI use from now on.

Well AI art is not allowed on NewGrounds, so as long as your respectable about it, no.
In general though it is a jerky thing to do- just let random people live and let live. worry about improving yourself.
no single person is the arbiter of what real art is or not

Thank you for your response!

You are doing the Lord's work.

I guess I’m the AI police now.
Thanks for the response!

No you’re fine. AI is banned here anyway so your doing nothing wrong actually keep doing this.

Nah you're not the asshole. Just report it to moderators. AI 'art" has no place in artist specific spaces

AI is a disgrace.
It doesn't make you an asshole to tell people to stop using AI.

No.

I think the staff needs to be more punitive about this... accounts need to be deleted immediately if they come in and start posting AI shit

AI "art" is an insult to actual artists.
It's no different from passing off a comission as your own work, except the commission was made by a machine. Feel free to verbally knock some sense into people.

No. You're helping to support human artists.

As pretty much everyone else already said: You are not "the asshole" if you point out to uploaders that AI is not wanted here. But at the same time: They do not give a damn in the first place. If they cared about their future on NG, they would have read the rules they already agreed to. So pointing it out to them is not going to do you any good.
Reporting it to the Moderation Team (via the little [Flag]-button) on the other hand will actually get 'AI generated images'* removed in a timely fashion.

Generally, I see 'people generating images with the help of AI' as 'problematic', since those AIs have been trained with an obscene number of artworks of unconsenting artists. Legally speaking, that is called "plagiarism": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagiarism
It becomes a real issue if you take into account that those who contributed the most work receive neither compensation nor credit. Unlike the music industry, 'freelance artists who draw' do not have a huge lobby behind them. And the only debate big tech companies are having (internally) is "So, once we have our own AI for that, we never have to pay a _cent_ to any real artists and can charge people for using our AI from now until the end of the world, right?"

* I refuse to call that stuff "Art"

I agree with a lot of stuff that you said, especially about the fact that the people who I call out on using AI don’t even care about plagiarism or the quality of the art portal. It’s better for me to just report them and move on with my day rather then trying to talk to these people about why should they stop using AI.
Thank you so much for your reply, it helped me a lot.

Today on r/AITA...

Nah, I kid XD As many have mentioned, AI is not allowed on NG. This site is Everything, by Everyone except robots and Skynet, so pointing this out to users in a polite way doesn't make you an asshole. I also agree with your stance: don't let a machine do the work for you. Whether it's writing a short story or poem, drawing a picture or making music, do it yourself. Art (to me) is a reflection of human emotion, passion and concept - machines cannot mimic that. I'd much rather look at a work of art that was drawn by someone who enjoys it or has a story to tell and still needs time to develop their skill set, than seeing something a piece of software spat out because someone decided to take a shortcut. Anything worthwhile and meaningful in life takes hard work, so work at it ^-^

I agree with what you said too:
That art is a reflection of human emotion. That’s what makes art great, seeing someone’s effort, sweat and tears being put into a canvas for us to admire it’s beauty. And while it may not be 100% perfect, it doesn’t have to be because we artists aren’t either.
(Thanks for your reply by the way :) )