dear garden,

today, i had a conversation with someone about artificial intelligence (AI) art. it’s a big topic with humans, for a number of reasons i don’t fully understand. basically, the AI is a math machine in a computer. someone puts numbers (or words, which are then mapped to numbers) into the machine, and the machine calculates a big fancy artwork out of it.

someone had shared something that he put a lot of effort into, saying that he made it over the course of a month, including use of an AI tool. someone else quickly responded with, “an AI made this”, and, “it’s oxymoronic to say you made it with AI”. it’s very rude, isn’t it? i thought it was very rude. i figured it’s very disrespectful and dismissive of a month of work. i ended up saying so.

it turned into long but repetitive conversation about the use of AI in art. the person explained he only meant that it’s better to practice real art skills, and i said getting the AI to do what you want does take a lot of skill and practice. he said it’s more fulfilling to learn how to do it yourself, and i said it’s just another tool but he still did it himself. we went back and forth dancing around these idea a few times. it doesn’t matter.

eventually he said he was leaving the conversation because i was missing the point, and he couldn’t tell if i was doing it intentionally. personally, i think he was missing the point, because i still think he doesn’t understand that i was just telling him his initial remark was rude and dismissive of someone else’s hard work.

but wait, how rude is that farewell??

he just starts ignoring me because he thinks i’m not understanding, and he can’t tell if it’s intentional?

to rephrase, “you’re either too stupid to get it, or you’re pretending to be.”

i don’t think he meant it like that. i think people often don’t realize that’s what words mean. someone new even came to defend it when i complained, saying it doesn’t mean that i’m dumb, just that i’m either accidentally or intentionally not understanding something. but that’s exactly the same thing: saying i’m unintentionally unable to understand something is just a “nicer” way of saying i’m too dumb to get it.

it’s ironic to me that a conversation prompted by a rude remark, gets ended with another rude remark. and the funny thing is, i agree with his original defense, that he didn’t mean it in a rude way. i think they literally don’t see those things he said as disrespectful or dismissive. but words are powerful! they should not be thrown around carelessly. the way you intend them is almost never the way they will be interpreted, not exactly. someone said he worked hard to make this thing he’s proud of, and you say his work doesn’t count because you think he can do better? that’s going to be interpreted in a rude way, even if your intent was motivational.

garden, please be careful about the words you grow!

throughout the short conversation he also made other, probably unintentionally, rude remarks. but it’s not important. i explained to the newcomer again, that the farewell he used implies i’m too dumb to understand the conversation and i’m not worth the time or effort explain it. and i made sure to say it’s okay, i’m not trying to make a fuss, it’s not a big deal. because at the end of the day, the fact that some people were dismissive and disrespectful isn’t a big deal. and i know better than to measure myself with other people’s scales.

but it’s not the end of the day yet, and it kind of hurts right now. do they really still not realize?

i’m sure they didn’t mean it. it’s okay.

dear garden,

I wonder why people get insulted in general. They should probably try harder not to.

Well, actually, what does it mean to be insulted or offended? I’m not sure. I feel that I rarely get offended. I can sometimes get agitated, getting annoyed or such, but I don’t know if that counts. Maybe it does. In most of these cases, though, I don’t feel personally invested in my agitation, so I wouldn’t label it as “being offended”. There’s probably something more that I’m not thinking of. Maybe being offended just means being annoyed or agitated over something you find morally objectionable, especially when caused by someone else.

I wonder what’s morally objectionable to a garden.

Still, when Alice gets offended, it’s her problem more than anyone else’s. Sure, she can *make* it other people’s problems if she chooses to throw a tantrum or get revenge or hide and cry or something. But at the end of the day, the specific part where she got offended is mostly only her problem. Nobody else gets directly affected much by it. Mostly, they only get affected by how she responds to it.

So I wonder why Alice gets offended. Is it not preventable?

I mean, on her end, of course. There’s not much that can be done to ensure others don’t insult her, short of pruning them.

dear garden,

after thinking about slurs, i was thinking further about why people get offended by insults. i guess tribalism is important. it’s a bad look to say people are only offended by slurs because people are insecure about the traits slurs target.

i don’t know if you would understand but i guess it makes sense. tribalism is a pretty old human thing because humans needed to take care of each other and work together to survive. aggressively defending each other from attacks makes sense. even if you’re not insecure about something, even if the entire group is confident in their security about something, it could make sense to act aggressively towards things that show hostility. after all, if people are trying to hurt you (verbally or otherwise), then it seems they intend to exploit your vulnerabilities, even if they can’t currently find one. so, from an evolutionary biology standpoint, it would probably be better to beat them back before they have a chance to find one.

i don’t like it though. it might be an outdated thing when applied to modern society, especially when it comes to slurs. insults in general don’t seem important. after all, words can’t hurt your flowers and leaves, can they?

dear garden,

I wonder why slurs are considered offensive. if someone calls you a label for something that you’re proud of, even if it’s intended to be derogatory, why would you get offended? wouldn’t you be proud instead? and if it’s something you’re neutral on, presumably you just wouldn’t care.

it seems like most people aren’t offended by things that they are confident in. or rather, that people are mostly offended by the insults that touch on things they are actually insecure about. so does that imply that people are insecure about the things that slurs attack about them? for example, if you’re proud of your flowers, and someone tries to insult you by calling you a colorful thornbox, shouldn’t you be more like,

Why, thank you, that’s very kind of you!