'Dear Teacher'

Instructions

Dear teacher, Lately there has been a spike in art making. However this art was not drawn by human hands. This art was made by a generative AI. AI art has been used by teachers at this school to make logos, posters, or even just for fun. However, AI art is not only bad for the environment, it is harmful to students too. At least, in a way. Maybe some of you have seen the videos where an artist draws some art, then drinks a glass of water. This is supposed to represent AI using too much water and hurting the environment. According to an article on generative AI's impact on the environment, "[a] great deal of water is needed to cool the hardware used for training, deploying, and fine-tuning generative AI models, which can strain municipal water supplies and disrupt local ecosystems. " (Explained: Generative AI’s environmental impact). Every time you make art using AI, it takes water that could be used for washing dishes, watering a garden, or drinking. Or maybe that water came from your local pond, or ocean. What happens when there's no water left? Another point: your students. How many kids have you seen drawing this month? Students at this school, and kids in general, love making art. We love drawing, painting, and digital art (by which I mean sites like Kleki, not AI). And here's the thing. When you make AI art, that art might not be AI. Not entirely anyway. See, to make AI art, an AI must be trained. "The process [of training an AI] often begins with a set of input data, like photographs, paintings, or drawings, which the AI uses to learn about styles, textures, and compositions." (“What Is AI-Generated Art?"). In short, AI is trained off of human art. For all you know, the cool drawing of a cat you AI generated yesterday could have been drawn by a human. Perhaps the AI just changed the colors, and added text. This is about the same as plagiarism. Supposedly, AI has artist's permission, so it's 'ok for this to happen'. However, AI does not always have permission. The website I use made it so that I could ONLY use it if I agreed to let AI use my art. However, the form did not say 'Let AI use your art and code' it said something like 'agree to our new terms of service'. If given a REAL choice, I would never use my art. But I was not given this choice. And not only this, but AI (and AI art) makes people feel bad. Some artists (especially those who are at the younger end of it, like me) are self conscious about their art. We constantly think 'is it good enough?' and 'should I share this?' It's not typically a problem, as we can work past it and we have supportive friends, but when we hear people talking about how good AI art is, and how it's so 'awesome' and 'cool', it really HURTS. It hurts us that you think a machine can make art that's as good (if not better) than human art. I understand that it is not ever your intention to make us feel bad, but seeing someone use AI art like it's regular art makes us feel bad. Furthermore, AI art is just about the same as AI writing. Same waste of water, same 'training'. If we can't use AI to write our essays or solve our homework, why can we use it to make logos or profile pictures? Now with all this in mind, I'm not blaming ANY of you for making AI art. You probably didn't even know the truth about it. I'm also not saying that AI is bad, just that AI ART is bad. Honestly, if used right, AI can be an amazing and useful tool! It's just that AI art is not using it right. Maybe next time, ask a student to draw you something? Or draw it yourself! Or find an image on the web (one that is legal to use). Honestly it doesn't matter if it's some shiny perfect art with a cute dog and amazing color scheme, or if it's nice hand-drawn papers with colored pencils and glitter. Both look amazing! So in conclusion, I ask you to please think about this next time you are about to click 'generate' in ChatGPT or Gemini.