The Evils of ai Chatbots.

A trigger warning for Sexual Assault and Suicide. 

Hellos! I know I write about such serious topics all the time, but I believe it’s quite necessary these days. This isn’t really the topic I thought I’d ever be writing about, but here we are. As I’ve reassessed past relationships, there was a common factor that led to the end of a friendship. Of course, there were other things that added to it, but Character ai had some part in it and I think I finally want to acknowledge this. 

What I’ll be calling all these ai chatbots is just Character ai, because it was the main one. Back in 2024 I had some really awful friends. They were addicted to Character ai, until more restrictions were added, then they were addicted to other NSFW chatbots. Obviously at the start of the friendships, everything was really good and normal and fulfilling for both of us - or so I thought. After some time, said friends would be using Character ai in all classes, on calls, overseas, or they’d even invite me over for a sleepover, to then spend the whole time chatting it up with a bot instead of me, a living breathing human female in their bed. It got so bad that one individual would cuddle me WHILE using the ai. I’m sorry, but I didn’t need to see those horny fucking chats. I understand the rise in hypersexuality in my generation, it’s very unfortunate, but expressing it in such a way is truly detrimental to our health. Another awful example which may be sort of a trigger warning for some, but before I got sexually assaulted, the person was using ai and I guess ‘sexually assaulting’ the bot too. I know it sounds stupid, it really is, but she wrote out a whole scene of her raping a gay ai chatbot. It feels so dystopian. Well it is dystopian. I never thought we’d live a life with such horrors. I suppose having control over something like a relationship is favourable for some, as you can change the response you get, you can ‘talk to anyone you want’, and so I guess the control must be so enticing that these people get sucked into it, it takes over their lives, or even takes their lives. 

I remember when there was a rise in teenage suicides from Character ai. I was mortified when I saw that such a young boy committed suicide over something that’s not even real. It scared me really bad. Even thinking about it now, it makes me sick. What makes me more sick is how it’s slowly becoming a bigger thing with adults, and they’re trying to normalise it. People are getting married to their ai chatbots. There was a father that ‘cheated’ on his wife with a chatbot. He chose ai over his wife and kid. I’ll never understand how anyone could ever do that, and it’s not even isolated to ai chatbots, it’s just the addiction to that fake dopamine rush a screen can give us. A part of the reason my father is gone is because he chose his games over me, so I feel for that woman, I feel for all those parents who’ve lost their children, I feel for anyone who’s lost another to this absolute bullshit, but I also feel for those who have lost themselves to the ai. We’re so broken as humans, just sucked in by loneliness or profits. If it weren’t for the money they’re making, it’d be shut down immediately. I’ve been keeping an eye on Character ai over the past few years, and I’ve seen all the changes. The further restrictions, the slow-mode feature, then earlier in the year the face ID requirement was taken down after a very short time of being put in place. They know most of their users are children, they know why they’ve made even a cent of money, so any changes they make are ultimately changed back or they’ll lose everything.

I must add my concerns for fictional worlds and how dangerous they can be. I’ll admit it once, I’m somewhat of an AO3 user, however I understand how it can affect me and my mental health so I’ll use it sparingly - even if it’s beneficial for me in some sort of twisted way. Some people didn’t catch that memo and are now so far torn from reality, they hurt people because they don’t even know what their actions are, let alone what consequences they’ll bring. I didn’t mean to go on such a tangent, but I could go on forever about this topic, and I’d love to, I really would, but I’m afraid I’ll bore people so much that I'll hardly get my main message out. Ai is dangerous as we already know, but it’s getting worse, infiltrating something as human as relationships, fucking up little kids before they know even half of what a relationship is. Even if it wasn’t actively destroying our planet, it is still very harmful. Our brains are rotting! Our children are dying! Our leaders' pockets are getting surprisingly full, while we’re out here starving and trying to cling onto the last bits of connection we have left. What more is there? This is all we wanted, isn’t it? 

- Sally