Weird Jerks Thrilled By Prospect Of AI Stealing Jobs From Greedy Poor People And Immigrants
Weird Jerks Thrilled By Prospect Of AI Stealing Jobs From Greedy Poor People And Immigrants
Yes, they actually just hate poor people.
As horrified as many of us are by the future implications of AI, conservatives have been pretty thrilled by it — cheering for a future where art, movies, television, music, etc. can be created by robots instead of actual human beings. They don’t exactly have a ton of talent and they hate having to rely on us for entertainment, so they have to hope for a sad future where they can fashion themselves an episode of “Seinfeld” in which Jerry asks “What’s the deal with women voting?!?” or can make Nick Fuentes’s words come out of George Carlin’s mouth — or when, finally, they can make their own AnCap Rage Against The Machine, in which “The Machine” is other human beings who want human rights.
Yet, in an oddly out-of-character move on Wednesday, self-described theocratic fascist Matt Walsh took a moment to consider the ways AI could negatively impact workers, suggesting that there should perhaps even be laws regarding its use.
“Unpopular opinion (among conservatives anyway),” Walsh wrote on social media in response to a video about Wendy’s using AI to monitor their drive-thru, “but there probably needs to be laws against this. AI is going to wipe out 80 percent of the jobs on the planet if we don’t do something.”
Woah if true.
Strangely, those who responded to Walsh’s post were not quite as concerned about AI actually replacing people in jobs as they have been about their other “replacement”-related insanity. Rather, they were very, very excited about the prospect of AI being used to replace all of the greedy minimum wage workers who so inconvenienced the poor franchise owners by expecting to be paid enough to live.
“This is what you get when you demand $20 minimum wage for entry level work.”
“All these immigrants being brought in to take jobs that will be gone in 10 years lol.”
“I’d rather this than $25 burgers.”
“Why? This will force people to get skilled labor jobs.”
“If the AI can get my order right and not also give me attitude, I'm going AI every time. Laws against implementing tools that better serve your customers? That sounds asinine.”
“Maybe they shouldn’t have demanded minimum wage to be $20 hr.”
“gud. there shite jobs enyway. dont need imgrants anymore send em all bak.”
“This eliminates the jobs we purportedly need immigration for. It is profoundly accretive to conservatism.”
“These are the jobs that are demanding $15-$20 per hour minimum wage right now, Matt. A lot of people complain about people wanting that much money for those jobs. This is a solution. This is the free market at work.”
“AI will take over jobs. It will be prompting a shift towards a more educated and qualified workforce. This would require more people to pursue education in order to support themselves. Low income people will need to find innovative ways to advance and fit in. Local community colleges will thrive in my opinion. It’s going to be a challenging process.”
“This wouldn’t have occurred if low skill labor got paid what they were actually worth. There should be laws against artificially setting the minimum wage.”
You know, we’ve really gotta drop the “Are there no workhouses?” as a standard-bearer for abject cruelty to the poor, because these fuckers don’t want the poor to have work or houses. Like, I think they would actually be offended by the idea of workhouses on the grounds that poor people shouldn’t expect to have any place to live in exchange for hours of grueling work, day in and day out. Although, of course, they should also refrain from being unhoused as that is just inconvenient and unsightly!
Let us take a moment and combine all of the things these people want and don’t want. They don’t want publicly subsidized college. They don’t even want people to go to college because college is where they are forced to think and meet other people who are not like them, and therefore where they are more likely to shift to the left. They don’t want fast food workers or other low wage workers to be paid a living wage, they don’t want subsidized housing (and certainly not subsidized housing near them) and they don’t even want more affordable multi-family units in their precious, precious suburbs. They don’t want any other social programs. They cheer for the idea of AI taking people’s jobs so that business owners can save money. They don’t want a universal basic income. They also don’t want to have to look at unhoused people. Somehow, it never occurs to them that it is just not remotely possible for them to get to have/not have all of those things. Of course, luckily for them, no one ever actually asks them how they actually expect this to work.
This guy … definitely doesn’t know how anything works.
I’m fine with it. Nobody likes that job anyway. Prices had better drop significantly when machines are running the show though. If not then something fishy is definitely going on. Also, Wendy’s is disgusting. No human should eat there if they want to live.
“Something fishy.” Right, because who can imagine a world in which business owners pay basically nothing for labor and don’t pass the savings onto you, the consumer. Except, you know, everyone living in the world we are living in right now, at this very moment. Wait ‘til this guy finds out about diamonds!
All of this being said, I was brought to literal tears this week by the Comcast AI assistant, both online and on the phone, and ended up desperately screaming “PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, LET ME TALK TO A HUMAN!!!” into the void so I’m not super sure that the magic Wendy’s drive-thru AI is going to be able to grasp difficult concepts like “no mayo, please!” or “can I get an extra sweet and sour sauce?” anytime soon.
Though I think it could probably handle the work done by many overpaid C-suite executives, no?
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Just keep chanting " Agent "over and over. Or, alternately, stay silent when prompted to answer the robot's queries. This usually will work to bring a human to the phone.
I like Wendy's. I've also noticed that at some stores that after I pay at the first window and move to the second (pick-up) window I would be waved back 10 feet until my order was ready. It didn't make any sense until I realized that the store probably a timer triggered when a car pulls up to the second window and they would get yelled at in the customer had to wait 15 or maybe 30 seconds to get their order. Since assembling an order in that time was not possible they tried to keep cars off the timer. Because micro-managing a fast food restaurant is such a great idea.
And what these tech bros don't understand is that when AI may take your order someone human is going to have to assemble it. Just like AI isn't going to pick your tomatoes or oranges because it's just a chatbot with no hands. What it's good at is writing reports, editorials and opinion pieces. The people most likely to be displaced by AI are the pundits and middle managers. You know, the people now gloating about how AI will displace all the poors.