'AI Vegans' are choosing to abstain from chatbots - and are risking their jobs to do so

Ever since ChatGPT exploded onto the scene in 2022 in a fray of em-dashes and adjectives, ‘AI’ has been the big bogeyman on everyone’s lips. Now it’s led to a growing online movement of generative AI phobics, ‘AI vegans’, who are determined to abstain from the technology no matter the cost.

Currently, the anti-AI community has over 43,000 members on Reddit, making it one of the site’s top 3% largest subreddits, while those denouncing its use have accumulated millions of views and likes on TikTok. Some creators have even labelled themselves “AI vegans” in their quest to stay clear of the omnipresent tool.

But why AI 'vegans'? Well, the name comes from comparisons drawn by many online that these AI teetotals share traits with real vegans, who abstain from animal products often on grounds of ethics and sustainability.

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And they have a point, at least where the environment is concerned. Based on one estimate, AI-related infrastructure may soon use six times the amount of water as Denmark – or half the amount of water as the UK, which has a population of 69 million.

They also stand against AI on moral grounds. The idea that generative AI is “stealing” people’s content has been the subject of intense debate since its inception. Some of the loudest voices against the use of AI have been creatives, some of whom claim their work is being scraped and used to train AI models without their consent.

Friction is only heightened by the fact that many companies and even political figures seem to be urging people to catch up or (effectively) get lost. For example, the BBC recently reported that Amazon’s boss told staff to embrace AI as the corporate workforce was expected to shrink. Meanwhile, the UK’s technology secretary Peter Kyle recently urged businesses and workers to get to grips with AI or risk getting “left behind”, as reported by The Guardian.

And while advancements in technology have forced workers to adapt in the past, the sheer volume of jobs projected to be lost does raise an eyebrow towards the argument that new ones might be created. In a 2024 report by the IPPR, these AI-inspired job cuts were projected to reach up to 8 million in what has been dubbed a “jobs apocalypse”.

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But these AI vegans aren’t just sitting back – they’re taking action. While much of the discourse around AI abstinence exists online, it is having very real-world effects. According to a recent survey by Writer and Workplace Intelligence, almost a third of staff have engaged in behaviour that could be considered AI sabotage. This includes entering sensitive company data, deliberately lowering the quality of their work and tampering with performance data.

Even more interesting, it also found that younger staff were more likely to resist, with 41% of Millennials and Gen Z admitting to undermining their workplace’s AI tools, compared to 23% of older employees. Meanwhile, on the subreddit r/antiAI, users have admitted to dropping university classes after being told to use the technology.

But perhaps most telling of the climate, the slur “clanker” is becoming a more popular term of abuse towards robots. Originally used as an insult directed towards robots in the Star Wars franchise, “clanker” is now being thrown around as a slur directed at AI: denigrating it for generating “slop” and simply not being human enough.

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