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The scene could have been pulled from a Nancy Meyers film. I found myself in Oregon wine country, inside a rustic-chic barn that reeked of stealth wealth, for a close friend’s rehearsal dinner. “This venue is ideal,” I told the groom-to-be. He moved closer as if revealing a secret: “I discovered it on ChatGPT.”

My expression was courteous as he detailed how AI tools assisted in the wedding preparations. (A real wedding planner was eventually hired.) I responded courteously. Inside, though, I resolved: if my future spouse came to me with wedding ideas from ChatGPT, there would be no wedding.

Modern Dating Red Flags: AI Usage.

Many individuals have usual romantic dealbreakers. Doesn’t smoke, is a cat person, desires kids. Over the past few months, as warnings of an approaching AI-induced doomsday have dominated my news feed and social conversations, I’ve developed a new one. I will not date someone who uses ChatGPT. (Or any AI tool really, but with 700 million weekly users, ChatGPT is by far the dominant and thus the object of my disdain.)

People often ask the “what if” questions. What if I use it for my job, but I dislike it otherwise? Imagine if I use it to help people? How about I only use it as a proofreading tool – I’d never use it to “write” anything. To all that I respond: there are individuals out there for you. But I am not one of them.

When a Simple Turn-Off Becomes a Moral Stand.

The phrase “getting the ick” describes that sensation of being unexpectedly disgusted. A key aspect of having an ick is not fully understanding why you found someone’s behavior so off-putting. For instance, I once felt the ick watching a man drink a smoothie from a straw. Initially, my ChatGPT dislike felt like a mere ick, a kneejerk feeling of disgust that had no any clear reasoning.

But here we are, in autumn 2025, and using the program even for harmless tasks such as planning a fitness routine or deciding what to wear feels an increasingly political choice. We know that the power-hungry tech drains our water supply and hikes electricity bills. It is marketed as a placebo for human connection; isolated, disconnected people finding companionship or even developing feelings with code is not as much a science fiction scenario as it is just the way things go now. The megarich tech bros in control of all this prioritize in terms of profit first and people second.

Sure, ChatGPT can create your shopping list. But does that personal benefit excuse the collective damage it creates?

The Dating Disaster: If Your Date Relies on ChatGPT.

As if it hadn’t done enough already, ChatGPT has somehow made dating even worse. A good friend lately told me that she went out with a man, and in the morning suggested they get breakfast together. He took out his phone, accessed ChatGPT, and requested for restaurant suggestions. Why build a relationship with someone who delegates decisions, including the fun ones like choosing where to eat? If someone is so lazy they’ll hit up ChatGPT to plan a first date, consider how minimal effort they’ll spend six months in.

It’s hard to see myself establishing a meaningful relationship with a person who often uses a tool that diminishes focus and might bring about societal collapse. Intellectual curiosity, creativity, originality – I likely won’t find what I value in someone who thinks “productivity” means asking an app to summarize a movie plot so they don’t have to waste their time, you know, watching it.

Reflect on whether your dating criterion genuinely aligns with your life aims.

According to Ali Jackson, a New York-based dating coach, she may use ChatGPT for particular tasks but doesn’t promote it. In the past six months or so, she states “every one” of her clients has approached her complaining about “chatfishing” or people who use AI to create everything on their dating apps – all the way down to the DMs they send. I inquired Jackson if my strike against ChatGPT chumps was too strict. She said no, go forth and evaluate, though it might reduce my dating pool – about 10% of the adult population now uses the tech.

“Ask yourself if your choice is really supporting your future goals,” Jackson said. “In your case, I would assume that’s one of your principles, and it’s important to find someone whose values are in sync with yours.”

Others Who Share the ChatGPT Aversion.

The aversion for AI applies beyond the romantic realm. Ana Pereira, 26, lives in Brooklyn and does sound for multiple live music venues across the city. She fantasizes about accessing her phone settings and deactivating AI features on all her apps, though tech platforms from Google to Spotify make it almost impossible to disable. Pereira thinks that using ChatGPT “shows such a laziness”.

“It’s like you are unable to think for yourself, and you have to rely on an app for that,” she said.

Two of Pereira’s friends lately had a complicated breakup. She sided with one of them after learning the other turned to ChatGPT, a notoriously poor therapy alternative, not their partner, when they wanted to talk about their feelings. “It’s like they didn’t want to endure any uncomfortable human feelings,” she said. “They just wanted to process something and continue, which is not how things work.”

Eventually, I could not handle it on my own. I had become too dependent on AI for even basic tasks.

Richard Barnes, who is 31 and is a marine biologist and restaurant server in Hawaii, is likewise skeptical. “I don’t know if I would think otherwise about someone who uses ChatGPT, but I would be like, ‘come on,’” he said. “You shouldn’t have to depend on it to make a grocery list. Your life is probably not that hard. We can make the list together.”

Celebrity and Industry Backlash.

When director Guillermo del Toro said he would “prefer death” than use AI tools, it made headlines. Similarly, SZA’s Instagram stories tirade against the tech cautioning about “environmental racism” and expressing fear over users who are “codependent on a machine”. The same goes for when Simu Liu, Alison Roman, Céline Dion, Emily Blunt, and others make statements that are critical of AI in their respective industries. I think these quotes go viral for a cause: people sympathize with them.

This sentiment exists even among those in the tech sector. Last month, Pinterest introduced a filter that lets users turn off AI content. Meta lets users hide, but not entirely remove, similar content on Instagram. Reports indicated that “cursor resistance” is on the rise, as some Silicon Valley techies won’t use AI to write their code.

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