{‘It demonstrates such a lack of effort’: the reasons I refuse to date someone who uses ChatGPT|The AI Dating Dealbreaker: The Reasons I Refuse to Go Out With a ChatGPT Enthusiast.

It was a scene lifted from a Nancy Meyers film. We were in Oregon wine country, inside a stylishly rustic barn that reeked of discreet wealth, for a friend’s rehearsal dinner. “This venue is perfect,” I told the future groom. He moved closer as if revealing a secret: “I discovered it on ChatGPT.”

My expression was courteous as he outlined how generative AI assisted in the wedding preparations. (A human wedding planner was eventually hired.) I responded courteously. Internally, though, I resolved: if my prospective spouse came to me with wedding input from ChatGPT, there would be no wedding.

Modern Romantic Dealbreakers: Artificial Intelligence Use.

Some people have typical relationship dealbreakers. Doesn’t smoke, prefers cat person, wants kids. During the past few months, as alarms of an impending AI-induced apocalypse have dominated my news feed and party conversations, I’ve developed a new one. I will not see someone who uses ChatGPT. (Or any generative AI program truly, but with 700 million weekly users, ChatGPT is by far the dominant and thus the object of my disdain.)

I’ve heard all the “what if’s”. Suppose I use it for my job, but I hate it otherwise? Imagine if I use it to assist people? What if I only use it as a proofreading tool – I’d never use it to “write” anything. To all that I say: there are people out there for you. But I am not one of them.

From ‘Ick’ to Political Stance.

The phrase “getting the ick” refers to that feeling of being suddenly turned off. Part of having an ick is not fully understanding why you found someone’s behavior so unseemly. For example, I once felt the ick watching a man drink a smoothie from a straw. Initially, my ChatGPT dislike felt like a simple ick, a kneejerk feeling of revulsion that lacked any solid reasoning.

But here we are, in autumn 2025, and using the tool even for benign tasks such as planning a fitness routine or choosing what to wear feels an increasingly ethical choice. We know that the power-hungry tech drains our water supply and increases electricity bills. It is marketed as a placebo for human connection; lonely, disconnected people finding companionship or even falling in love with code is not as much a sci-fi scenario as it is just the way things go now. The ultra-wealthy tech bros in charge of all this think in terms of profit first and people second.

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

The Romantic Disaster: If Your Date Uses ChatGPT.

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

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

Consider whether your relationship preference actually aligns with your long-term aims.

Ali Jackson, a dating and relationship coach based in New York, uses ChatGPT for some tasks – but she is not an evangelist. In the past six months or so, she states “every one” of her clients has come 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 harsh. She said no, proceed and evaluate, though it might limit my dating pool – about 10% of the adult population now uses the tech.

“Ask yourself if your choice is really serving your long-term goals,” Jackson said. “In your case, I would assume that’s one of your values, and it’s important to find someone whose beliefs are aligned with yours.”

Others Who Share the ChatGPT Aversion.

The aversion for AI extends beyond the dating realm. Ana Pereira, 26, resides in Brooklyn and does sound for various live music venues across the city. She dreams about going into her phone settings and disabling AI features on all her apps, though tech platforms from Google to Spotify make it nearly impossible to opt out. Pereira believes that using ChatGPT “demonstrates such a laziness”.

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

A recent acquaintance’s breakup was particularly ugly. She supported one of them after discovering the other turned to ChatGPT, a notoriously poor therapy substitute, not their partner, when they needed to talk about their feelings. “It’s like they refused to sit through any uncomfortable human feelings,” she said. “They just wanted to deal with something and continue, which is not how things work.”

Eventually, I found not manage it on my own. I had become too reliant on AI for the routine tasks.

Richard Barnes, a 31-year-old marine biologist and server in Hawaii, has comparable views. “I don’t know if I would think differently 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.”

Well-Known Figures and Tech Professionals Speaking Out.

When director Guillermo del Toro said he would “rather die” than use AI tools, it made news. Similarly, SZA’s Instagram stories rant against the tech cautioning about “environmental racism” and expressing fear over users who are “codependent on a machine”. Ditto still for when Simu Liu, Alison Roman, Céline Dion, Emily Blunt, and others issued statements that are skeptical of AI in their various industries. I believe these quotes spread widely for a reason: people agree with them.

Even, to an extent, the people who power the tech industry. Last month, Pinterest added a filter that lets users turn off AI content. Meta lets users hide, but not entirely remove, similar slop on Instagram. Reports suggested that “cursor resistance” is on the rise, as some Silicon Valley professionals refuse to use AI to write their code.

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