I always wanted great boobs. But genetically they just weren't in the cards for me. I had to buy mine. And I suppose you could say I cheated. I used technology to have and be what I wanted. They also happened to be a tax write off, but I digress. I love my fake boobs. But that doesn’t make them real. They’ll always be silicone and saline. Aftermarket parts created by someone else. If you told me, and trust me, a ton of people have, that they’re not as good as organic, I wouldn’t argue. I used a tool to make myself feel better, but ethically it would be wrong to try and pass them off as if I grew them myself.
I’ve always wanted to be a writer to. To be totally honest, I never thought I could be. But when I decided to try, the learning curve was and still is, steep as hell. I cringe when I see that my first book Memoirs of a Stripper has sold a copy. Not because I’m embarrassed at the content, although maybe I should be. But because it is the very start of my journey as a wanna-be writer. I asked a family member to help me edit it, and they ran it through an editing software program, that fucked up what I was trying to say in its effort to create perfect grammar. I scrapped it and put out my own self edited and self-published version. And yeah, it’s got issues still. But it’s all me.
I can confidently say that every single book, article, page, paragraph, and sentence from there has been better. Not perfect, but better. My tits are perfect. Perfectly fake, but perfect. My writing, however, is not perfect. And I love that for me.
When I started writing fiction. I struggled. Desperately wondering if my ideas were stupid. Then pushing through anyway. Getting stuck staring at the dreaded blinking curser. Having to ask myself repeatedly if I am actually as funny as I think I am. I know now that I am hilarious. Consulting my teenage son, a real live person, about murder ideas. The disco ball death in my zombie novella is all him. And yeah, I’m a fucking proud mama. But every time I busted through the blocks and self-doubt to get to the point where I was ready to send it off, I learned. I fought imposter syndrome and the brick in my stomach, not to mention the voice in my head saying, “They’re all going to laugh at you”, and hit send, I grew. Got a little tougher.
My first time working with a real editor, was a terribly uncomfortable experience. Like a pap smear from a hot doctor. Being examined and judged in such an intimate way made me feel vulnerable in ways that I never felt showing my genitals to strangers on stage. But growth doesn’t come from comfort.
My growth as a writer came one bop on the head from an editor at a time. Sometimes a throat punch, or eyeball poke. Having my nose rubbed in my excessive use of the words like, really, and hella. Having to explain why I assumed my readers would all know what a stage fee is or a tip rail for that matter. And then having to work that explanation into my story without it looking like I was working that into a story.
Defending my decision to die on such hills as refusing to capitalize ‘god’ when it’s not being used as a name. Or that females can have ‘the balls ’to do something. All these little fights and micro-humiliations have indisputably made me a better writer. And all of them came from a real live human being. Not some bullshit app that wants me to conform to its stolen ideas of what good writing is. Nope my words are straight filtered through a human brain with its own experiences and opinions, having read, not scanned or pilfered real books written by real people. And even when it hurts, maybe especially when it hurts, I am growing and learning.
AI can be a useful tool. In data entry and automation and other ethical applications, I have no doubt it will find its place, and we will be better for it. I’m working on the assumption it doesn’t become sentient and kill us all of course.
But it has exactly no place in any stage of the creative process in any medium. Full. Fucking. Stop. None.
Creating art is hard. Really fucking hard. Take it from a stripper whose last really productive writing class was in the eighth grade (Thanks Mr. P.). Every struggle, every battle, and every deleted word is fucking hard as fuck. But that’s what makes it art. It’s humanity. Its imperfectness is what makes it magnificent. It’s how we connect with our fellow imperfect human beings.
Writing is not meant to be easy, the process shouldn’t be more efficient and cleaner. It’s not meant to be, nor should it be perfect. It should be hard and messy and filthy on every level from start to finish. Use of AI in any part of the process is cheating yourself as a writer, but it’s also cheating your readers. It’s stealing, of the worst kind. You’re stealing someone else’s hard-fought battles, their unease, and self-doubt. Their experiences, their thoughts and words were stolen so you could cheat to avoid the hard parts.
I may not ever be a great writer, maybe not even a good one. But my words and my ideas, my fuck ups and triumphs, will always be my own. My writing won’t ever be as perfect as my tits, but it will never be as fake.