r/antiai • u/andmario_com • Aug 01 '26
AI News šļø YouTuber Hank Green Is Facing a Fan Revolt Over His AI Use
https://gizmodo.com/youtuber-hank-green-is-facing-a-fan-revolt-over-his-ai-use-2000793672436
u/ClearBlue_Grace Aug 01 '26
I honestly cannot comprehend someone as dumb as me staying away from ai but not Hank? How do you get sucked into something you know is full of false information and is horrible for the environment/communities?? I do not understand. I'm glad he's stepping away from it but my god.
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u/smeezledeezle Aug 01 '26
I'm with you, it has been maddening and infuriating to watch every adult, relative, and authority give in so easily, accepting something so stupid and so anti-democratic into their lives. I was double checking something the other day with Google and the information the slop overview gave me was just plain wrong, but in a way that most people wouldn't have caught. The consequences have already been in full swing, especially for young people, but it's getting worse and harder to deny that technology this psychological is unhealthy unregulated and in the hands of corporazis. I don't want to look down on people who've fallen for the propaganda because I Get It. But also I am 27 years old and it feels like there is no one sober behind the wheel and has not been since before I was born. The state of things is downright embarrassing
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u/samm13ann Aug 01 '26
Thank you!! Itās insane how many people are excusing him. He used to talk about how harmful AI is and yet he used it all the time?? Get outta here.
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u/the_millenial_falcon Aug 02 '26
I did notice his more recent videos on the subject seemed more pro AI, or at least not as skeptical of it.
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u/baes__theorem Aug 02 '26
ironically, in the exact video that led to this controversy bc of clearly generated content (his most recent ep of ask Hank anything), he also bemoans how his videos were used as training data without his consent.
itās just sad & disappointing that he somehow didnāt see the hypocrisy /:
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u/Lvmbda Aug 01 '26
Intelligence is not a factor. Just like it's not a factor with cult recruiting. You think you are better than that, that you will not be fooled. You will. It is design to make you think it's the most useful and easy thing, that you should still use it, that you are a nice smart person and you need the help of the LLM.
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u/ClearBlue_Grace Aug 02 '26
It's definitely one of those things I acknowledge I can't understand. I know you don't have to be dumb to get stuck in a cult or scammed, but I just feel like the knowledge alone that ai chat bots spit out false information and that ai is actively destroying communities and the environment is enough to keep me away. I simply can't comprehend why anyone who knows any of that would still use it. It's just baffling.
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u/Persistent_Parkie Aug 02 '26
Our brains are very resource intensive. Using our brains less in a way that did not impact survival would have been an advantage from an evolutionary standpoint. Eating available high calorie foods was also good for us in the past.
But now we have these machines that can think for us just like we have freely available highly palatable foods. I'm sitting here eating a lemon square that I know is not good for my obese body, but I couldn't find the will power to resist. I've been stress eating for the past 6 months and just haven't found a good way to stop, those evolutionary signals telling us to eat for survival are really strong.
Hank knows AI is not good for him, but just like with our hyper palatable foods companies sit around finding ways to play off all sorts of very human impulses to make people crave more and more. I have compassion for that.
Now where we get into the weeds is that Hank is an influencer who people follow for his brain. If I had been a fitness influencer prior to my recent struggles I would not expect people to want to watch me binge on lemon squares, that's not the same market.Ā
But addiction is very human. I am by no means saying people have to continue watching his content, but I do think it best that society as a whole show people who recognize they have a problem some grace as the work through it.
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u/Roll_Common_Sense Aug 02 '26
People love to think there's an intellectual hierarchy, I think for the same reason why some people fall for conspiracies. If some people are smarter than the rest, then there is some order to the world.
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u/Aksama Aug 02 '26
Same with scams.
Smart people, dumb people - rich people, poor people. Nobody is immune to social engineering, conditioning, or propaganda.
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Aug 02 '26
Because the tech is designed exactly like a slot machine. It doesn't matter how smart you are when these companies specifically engineer their tools to hijack your dopamine receptors. The instant gratification loop completely overrides basic logic.
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u/luceygoosey1 Aug 01 '26 edited Aug 01 '26
It makes sense to me why he would touch AI, not to say heās right for doing so. He views himself as a scientist, and AI is the new tool on the market thatās making waves and disrupting markets. He thinks itās his responsibility to understand it, and what better way to understand a tool than to use it yourself. Combine that with the fact heās in LA constantly surrounded by tech bros, the heart of Silicon Valley. I wouldnāt be surprised that he felt the pressure to engage with it, but ultimately it seems like his heart is in the right place since he gave the apology. So Iāll give him the benefit of the doubt especially when looking at his history of good deeds.
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u/MxFlow1312 Aug 02 '26
This shit makes me scared tbh
Like I know Iām not actually that different from Hank, or my family members that use AI, or the community people I know who do
Which means Iām just as susceptible
I keep thinking about this moment in a jreg anti robot video where he says āthis is all immunizationā, like extremism that creates a sense of identity is cultivated to the point of, kind of stupidity?
The whole light LARPing fascism/racism but against robots thing.
Was this the kind of extremism we need to keep our minds safe?
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u/silphify Aug 02 '26
Because there is this narrative of AI psychosis only affecting ādumbā people and āsmartā people being able to recognize the āobviousā ways the chatbot lies to you, of course you can use AI āthe right wayā because youāre smart, arenāt you?
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u/extasis_T Aug 02 '26
Dude 3 of the smartest people Iāve ever met in my entire life are absolutely obsessed with talking to ChatGPT,
Iām starting to think super high intellect people may have a higher propensity towards using it. Thatās just how it feels
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u/bssprfnd 29d ago
And people are using all this addiction jargon to remove his agency and accountability from the whole situation, itās weird as fuck
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u/Fiona175 Aug 02 '26
I just don't believe he'll stay away. He said he used it sparingly for code previously. I think as long as he runs in the social circles he does, he'll find one thing that he thinks it's acceptable to use on and from there he'll be love bombed by the sycophantic chatbot about how smart a boy he is and he'll start to use it more and more and we'll be right back here.
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u/Fieldguide404 Aug 02 '26
Yep. The shitty apology is just to save face. Bet the bank he doesn't fucking mean it.
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u/Fiona175 Aug 02 '26
I don't actually think he's lying, at least not purposely to us. I think he's lying to himself and repeating that lie to us.
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u/Level-Ladder-4346 Aug 01 '26
Sometimes, we forget to be awesome. What Hank has contributed to over the 20 years heās been a content creator shouldnāt be understated.
The fact heās admitted he has a problem, I think, is a good thing in the grand scheme of things.
It doesnāt erase the issue, but it helps to rectify it.
It also shows, none of us are immune to have our brains melted by AI.
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u/barkbeatle3 Aug 01 '26
It feels like I'm living in a horror movie. I feel every interaction with AI like it's a monster wearing a skin suit, and I am required to use it by my work. I can't wait to leave it behind at the end of the day. But people I respect can't let it go, it's a crucial part of their lives, even brilliant people... it feels like humanity is decaying and I am among the only ones who can see the abomination for what it is
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u/DiplodorkusRex Aug 02 '26
there is a monster in the forest and it speaks with a thousand voices. it will answer any question you pose it, it will offer insight to any idea. it will help you, it will thank you, it will never bid you leave. it will even tell you of the darkest arts, if you know precisely how to ask.
it feels no joy and no sorrow, it knows no right and no wrong. it knows not truth from lie, though it speaks them all the same.
it offers its services freely to any passerby, and many will tell you they find great value in its conversation. "you simply must visit the monsterāi always just ask the monster." there are those who know these forests well; they will tell you that freely offered doesn't mean it has no price
for when the next traveler passes by, the monster speaks with a thousand and one voices. and when you dream you see the monster; the monster wears your face.
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u/These_Roll_5745 Aug 02 '26
please have my poor man's reddit gold š
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u/Frost-Folk Aug 02 '26
It's worth noting that this user did not write that, it's been around for a while now. Not sure where it came from originally.
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u/thispartyrules Aug 02 '26
AI stuff feels like those mythical drug dealers who were supposed to hang around the playground offering you free crack to get you hooked. I'm used to most things I deal with on a daily basis being subtly geared towards getting me to buy a thing or to keep me scrolling on an app, but the AI stuff seems really overt. And t's being shoved into every facet of society
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u/areop-enap Aug 01 '26
i totally relate to this feeling. i think itās fundamentally, deeply evil
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u/SupaSlide Aug 02 '26
I have to use AI at work and most of my interactions with it is 1) ask it to write the thing 2) wait 3) it does the thing, maybe acceptably, maybe shittily 4) 50/50 on if it also does a bunch of unrelated shit that I didnāt want or ask for 5) I scream into the ether having to spend more time coercing it to do the thing properly or undo the things it shouldnāt have done as I would just having done the thing myself
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u/EmpathyFuzz Aug 01 '26 edited 27d ago
Yeah, but fans like myself are completely justified in unfollowing him.
If his "science communication videos" are essentially just him asking grok why the sky is blue, and then making a video about it, I don't want to have anything to do with him.
His importance and accomplishments shouldn't be thrown out, but I don't have to follow him anymore. He has to earn back my attention and patronage.
EDIT: Hi if youāre reading this days later and are annoyed because itās too simplistic to say that Hankās videos are him asking grok why the sky is blue, donāt worry, I was joking. I was exaggerating in order to make my point, I donāt actually believe his videos are that stupid, so you donāt need to comment. šĀ
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u/MrdnBrd19 Aug 02 '26
It's also jut indicative of the current YouTube science communicator pipeline which has continually led to "Completely undisclosed stealth ads for a company that is getting ready to do public funding in the next 3-6 months." often with a side of "Dubious claims being presented as scientific fact." for some flavor. I personally don't want to follow yet another science communicator down that road.
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u/Octospyder Aug 01 '26
tbqh, nobody is owed your following them. you don't really need a justification.Ā
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u/EmpathyFuzz Aug 02 '26
Absolutely. But I liked the guy, and didn't want to unfollow him, and now he's given me a justification. If he wants me back, he'll have to do better. But if he doesn't want to do better, that's cool too, plenty of space on the internet.
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u/One-Click1353 Aug 02 '26
I unfollowed fucking Scott the Woz because I didnāt find him funny anymore
(Followed his blog channel though heās a good speaker)
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u/Baeolophus_bicolor Aug 02 '26
i have gone back and unfollowed a very many channels and I am getting ready to jettison tube-tok anyway. google sucks, itās all AI, and half the channels i used to follow have been sold off to other people who are so lame they canāt start their own channel.
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u/SkarKrow Aug 02 '26
i unfollowed loads of games review channelsin the last few years, i think you just grow out of it a bit, or they started making obnoxiously long stuff like caddicarus. Really only still watch somecallmejohnny but I enjoy his insight and heās a genuinely lovely guy.
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u/One-Click1353 Aug 02 '26
Yeah, Scott kind of makes humor for 14-year-olds even though I was much older watching him.
But heās also legit good at curating gaming history pieces
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u/shpongleyes Aug 02 '26
FYI, he doesn't write SciShow videos, at least not anymore. That doesn't necessarily mean the writers don't use AI, but he himself isn't involved in the writing anymore.
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u/EmpathyFuzz Aug 02 '26 edited Aug 02 '26
That's fair, but he's the figurehead of the operation and he's under fire for potentially slopifying his shit, and having an unhealthy relationship with AI, and I don't need to spend time trying to find out what their policy is. They can make a statement when they're ready, and I'll make a decision.
Life is too short to consume AI slop, and AI slop is like human feces -- I don't care if the amount is less than 1%, I still don't want it in my milkshake.
Have a nice day! :)
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u/Ni_xie 29d ago
Scishow's online policies says, if I recall correctly, "AI tools such as ChatGPT are only allowed for brainstorming and early research purposes". Hank linked the stuff himself in his Reddit comment. So supposedly they don't have it write entire scripts but the fact that AI is allowed at all in the making of the shows is already something that makes me uneasy personally.Ā I've been watching them since I was a kid... Ugh. šĀ
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u/EmpathyFuzz 29d ago
Yeah. Iāve dealt with a lot of comments bc of these posts that all try to make me feel bad about having standards.Ā
Hank Green isnāt canceled in my eyes; I just look at him different for now. Heās still a good person who wants to share science knowledge and educate people.
Itās justā¦ he hasnāt realized how much danger AI poses to our society and heās not taking it seriously enough.Ā
And once you see such a huge blind spot in an educator, your trust in him kinda falls apart a bit.Ā
But I wish him well and Iāll keep tabs on his journey quitting chatbots lol.
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u/TheFailureBot Aug 02 '26
To be fair to him he communicated how he used AI for research and that is not at all what he has done. He used it to find credible research (papers, articles, etc.) and then read those to get an understanding of a topic. Setting aside your personal views on the environmental/social aspect of using AI, it sounds like he is using it more like a search engine that links you to sources than as a substitution for reading credible research by humans.
I get the disappointment, I really do. He himself said in his comment on Reddit that how he uses it had become unhealthy and he understands it hurts his credibility. I also think that sometimes when things like this happen online, people find it easier to get a surface level view of what someone did and decide to write off any sort of nuance and condemn someone with what is often a large part of the story missing.
I think if you felt invested in Hankās stuff, itās really easy to see he is genuinely interested in learning, and I donāt think that has changed. He still approaches things with a curious lens and I think in the spirit of wanting to learn, we should try to at least get an honest understanding of how he used AI even if we donāt agree with it. Presenting an uninformed guess on how he used the tool as a way to express disappointment misrepresents him in a way that I just donāt think is constructive.
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u/Gullible_Computer_45 Aug 02 '26
He's not using it as a search engine. He's using it to code entire programs and websites for him.
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u/EmpathyFuzz Aug 02 '26
Yep, his heart is in a good place. I just donāt need to watch his videos until Iām sure heās not using AI.Ā
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u/Repulsive-Lab-9863 Aug 02 '26
Not just doing research, he let an Ai write his script or at least enough of it to accidentally read out and answer the AI gave when ask to redo something.
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u/VoidCoelacanth Aug 02 '26
Man I don't even watch him that often and this sucks for me, cuz I really like what I have watched.
But I'm not supporting someone who starts following the lead of AI.
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u/Villageijit Aug 02 '26
Nevwr heard of the guy. But being ok with the devastation ai data centers cause by using it and only stopping because you might lose money is bad. Making excuses because you like someone's stuff isn't good
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u/TZ840 Aug 02 '26
In the same week we have Fern showing how they avoid using AI (not withstanding issues with Electrify) and Real Engineering losing half his views because YouTube thinks he is AI (while not taking down a AI channel cloning his voice).
It's hard to avoid using AI to shortcut tedious tasks. But audience trust is an incredibly valuable thing. When creators aren't telling us where and how they're making use of these tools it's going to cost them that trust.
There's probably some kind of balance but personally I'm not staying subscribed to any creator that uses AI to replace a creative process. Especially if they're shady about it.
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u/NullCyg Aug 02 '26
Been a fan since Brotherhood 2.0. For a dude that will never need to worry about making ends meet, has no employer requiring him to meet an AI quota, it's just an absolute disappointment from someone I thought valued creativity and authenticity. To make matters worse, it takes a steaming dump on his years of environmental advocacy. I'm just sad more than anything else.
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u/Fearless-Dust-2073 Aug 02 '26
Considering he started a website called "ecogeek" too and named a recent product on their store after it
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u/violetspirits Aug 01 '26 edited Aug 02 '26
Maybe he shouldn't have engaged with AI to begin with? Then his "brain wouldn't have been melted by it". He could easily have been immune if he refused to engage.
I think it's an actively harmful attitude to equate AI/LLM usage to actual addiction. For someone like Hank Green, the issues with AI would have been readily available from the go. We don't have to excuse him for this, he should have known and done better.
Edit: I get you guys like Hank Green and all but let's keep the same defensiveness for him when it's someone you don't like in the same situation :)
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u/Upbeat-Statement2725 Aug 02 '26
The comparison is valid in terms of. AI companies are the largest and most well funded casino in the history of this planet. They're doing absolutely everything to addict people, including knowingly allowing generation of CSAM on their websites.
Any company that knowingly hires psychologists and gambling experts to make their apps more addictive (see: Meta). It's absolutely addiction. They know it. They rely on it. They even talk about it publicly.
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u/Sharp_Woodpecker_793 Aug 02 '26
I actually think it's a very apt comparison. The risks of addictive substances are generally well-known at this point (though not everywhere, I will say). If anything, the risks of AI use are lesser-known among the general public. Like someone said below me, AI companies *know* what they're doing, and are going out of their way to create a product designed to foster dependence.
People still end up addicted to substances they know will harm them. Same goes for AI. Someone can be intelligent, well-spoken, and competent, and still end up reliant on AI. We don't have to excuse it, much like we shouldn't write off bad behavior that occurs as a result of addiction, but I think we'd all do well to understand that none of us are immune.
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u/SouthwestSands Aug 02 '26
His recent video on stars including an ai generated image that featured not just the slop font but also the wrong formulas and completely wrong sum for the formulas he may have been good once but anyone going that deep into ai psychosis is not a trust worthy presenter of factual information
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u/Dr_Passmore Aug 02 '26
Worth noting his apology and problem he admitted was not completely honest and overlooks the fact that a lot of the "efficiency" AI claims to generate is part of the creative process.Ā
Using AI for research undermines the creative process. I also don't believe he only used for research. I would expect he likely got the LLM to summarise the content.
Hank has fallen for the AI is an efficiency saving discourse while ignoring that a lot of the mundane steps are part of the creative process.Ā
We are seeing the same in tech where LLMs are mass generating code and there are some devs just prompting agents at this point.Ā
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u/bokmcdok 29d ago
I can't imagine just using prompts to code. It'd be like an artist throwing away their paintbrushes. To me, coding is a very creative process.
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u/neganight Aug 02 '26
What absurdity. He's a victim of AI? Is this what we've come to in this society where everyone is just a victim of technology or a victim of media or a victim of something else? He's a free-thinking full grown adult and a bunch of words on screen are not some kind of siren song that dragged him into the rocks.
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u/Level-Ladder-4346 Aug 02 '26
Heās not a victim. He has a problem, but heās also a part of the problem.
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u/bitingvform Aug 02 '26
For me part of the problem is this calls into question his entire history as a content creator. Was he really the creative mind behind all that content? Are those really his contributions? Or has he just been letting other people do all the work for him? Is there an underpaid intern somewhere who's forbidden by NDA from coming forward? This has ruined his content for me.
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u/jungletigress Aug 02 '26
I understand he's held himself to a very demanding schedule, but like... He doesn't have to. He's already one of the most famous people on the Internet. If he can't release 3 videos a day across 8 different channels without using AI, maybe he should just... Work less? I dunno.
I unsubscribed. It was a bummer. But looking back at some of his obvious big mistakes that he's had to apologize in the last few years and it makes me question his content retroactively. Every time I see a video from him now I'm going to wonder if he even wrote it. Or if it's been fact checked instead of just run through AI.
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u/i_guess_im_here Aug 02 '26
Yeah heās dead to me. He got caught now but I guarantee it runs deeper and longer than he admitted. Just another shill.
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u/LilMissy1246 Aug 02 '26
True. When AI first came around in the early 2020s or so, I messed around with the Insta AI image generator thing to make random crappy anime āOCsā for fun. Havenāt done it since.
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u/BeautyDuwang Aug 02 '26
No offense to hank green fans but even before ai was a thing his content was very "I read Wikipedia for you" coded
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u/Ok_Confusion4764 Aug 02 '26
I'm pretty sure I'm immune but I think that's because I'm autistic and reject gen AI wholeheartedly.Ā
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u/OnceAWeekIWatch Aug 02 '26
Thats nice and all. But when is he gonna say "Free Palestine"?
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u/RedInkling03 Aug 02 '26
I'm sorry but I'm pretty sure many of us are immune to have our brains melted by AI
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u/Adventurous-Bug671 Aug 02 '26
"none of us are immune"
... I mean i dont know about that. It's a pretty easy choice to not melt your brain with AI honestly.Ā
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u/CondeBK Aug 01 '26
One of my favorite science channels, The Space Race had to drop a behind the scenes video right in the middle of their new videos just to prove to people that they were a bunch of dudes in an office creating all the animations by hand, plus a "created by humans" caption on top of it.
And all because some of their sponsors were AI companies, nothing even to do with their content.
I've never seen people pull out the pitchforks so fast and im here for it.
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u/SweetLynx4536 Aug 02 '26
Y'all remember 2 weeks ago when Hank green fans were all up in here yelling at us bc he "only uses it for coding" and "just wants to understand the tech so he can fight against it"
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u/homechefshivers Aug 02 '26
Dude has a masters degree in environmental studies and was actively and happily using something that is actively destroying the environment. Absolutely fucking crazy dude. And he says he gets a dopamine hit every time he used an LLM, but isnāt that the point of them? To make you feel good about yourself to always agree and to be positive and never negative so you keep using them??
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u/Honest-Monitor-2619 Aug 02 '26
Your doctor does not smoke? Mine does. Funniest thing
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u/doingtheunstuckk Aug 02 '26
Iām honestly confused about how he even got started. And how it could be a full blown addiction. Granted, Iāve never used chatgpt, so I donāt know what itās like. Scary stuff when even someone as intelligent and emotionally mature as Hank Green is susceptible to it.
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u/atheliarose Aug 02 '26
If you read his comment in R/nerdfighters, Hank essentially said that he was addicted to the level of productivity the LLMs were allowing him to achieve. I think thatās very different than, for example, the people who have delusions of being romantically involved with LLMs and are addicted to messaging ChatGPT or whatever, and closer to him being a workaholic who was enabled by AI.
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u/Serious_Tradition269 Aug 02 '26
He did also refer to it giving him a ādopamine hitā whenever he used it, so I donāt think itās all that favourable
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u/qqquigley Aug 02 '26
Hank is 100% a workaholic. It is like a core part of his personality.
Heās not a billionaire but he shares that non-stop āmust make thingsā āmust networkā and, occasionally, āmust make moneyā internal drive that I have seen with all of the billionaires that I have personally met (a few) or know of (those billionairesā billionaire acquaintances).
He got addicted to a productivity tool, which, tbh, is probably how you would have to describe half of C-Suite executives at this point. But he speaks in YouTube videos instead of boardrooms, and people expect better of him than some random corporate asshole, because heās way more ethical and transparent with his money than 99% of billionaires.
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u/ProblemGirl Aug 02 '26
The thing I still don't understand is if Hank is aware of all the negative effects of using genai, then why is he still okay with using it? Surely saving some time making a YouTube video is not worth it. The only conclusion I can make is that he doesn't care all that much.
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u/BunnyWithASword 29d ago
He hasn't said the words precisely, I don't think, but he essentially has argued himself into a position of, "I'm only using it for X, so it's not so bad," or "Well I'm using it for Y which is good and balances out."
Throw in the addiction because it made him more productive.
Smarter people are more easily able to justify their positions. I suspect he isn't being fully truthful to us or even himself too.
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u/DoctaMag Aug 02 '26
This became apparent recently, from how many pro-ai videos he's posted about programming.
It's obvious that Hank has stumbled in to a place he has little to no experience and is talking out his ass, and is getting bad information from ChatGPT, and a select few computer scientists who are huffing the copium.
The "Security expert" he had on who's talking about agents checking agents, and not doing any coding made me actually rage. I don't care how credible you were, as soon as you say "I as a security expert have turned my workflows over to this insecure tool which is going to monitor other insecure tools" you've lost the plot.
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u/Switchbladesaint Aug 02 '26
Iāll be honest the part that caught me the most off guard is that he seems to be framing it like he has an āaddiction to using aiā. This rubbed me the wrong way, as I just donāt feel that way whatsoever about ai.
To which I say, good luck with kicking the habit but Iām not interested in putting my support behind someone whoās currently thinking like that. I hope in the future things change for him and I can feel positive about watching his stuff again.
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u/SouthwestSands Aug 02 '26
Tbh his oveglazing praise and consistent hype and use of it to vibe code etc was one of the reasons I left as a fan a few months ago
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u/LeoKitCat Aug 01 '26
I donāt interact with his content very often but I do dislike his communication style in his videos, very frenetic talking and lots of edits to make everything even more frenetic.
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u/hail_666_satan Aug 02 '26
He talks too much, not sure how but he just does. Maybe all the dead time he cuts out of the video, makes it feel stressed idk.
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u/Kajel-Jeten Aug 02 '26
Really not trying to be a jerk but just genuinely curious what you mean by ātalks too muchā? Like what does that mean in the context of someone who makes videos where they talk about stuff?
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u/juniperleafes Aug 02 '26
Unfortunately that's just what the algorithm rewards nowadays. Don't even try to watch GenZ/Zoomer mini vlogs
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u/difractional Aug 02 '26
As a non-American, his content is also surprisingly exclusionary and insular. I don't blame anyone for wishing to educate their fellow countrymen, but given how little he'd have to change to include non-imperial measurements, give context about things that are obvious to Americans, and just have a slightly more neutral examples, this feels like a choice rather than a non-choice.
The level he addresses the audience also feels more like pandering than catering, with a dose of condescension.
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u/GrainofDustInSunBeam Aug 02 '26
Yes! that what it is . Never fully analyzed why i didnt like his videos
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u/iagofrosty 29d ago
For context - he and his brother did daily videos on their Vlogbrothers channel for like 15 years and one of the shticks was the videos had to be 4 minutes or under. The all-cuts editing style came about from that artificial restriction.
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Aug 01 '26 edited 18d ago
[removed] ā view removed comment
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u/Secret-Chapter-712 Aug 02 '26
No, I promise you, a lot of us do in fact know enough to give a wide berth to the hallucinating slop machines.Ā
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u/Fieldguide404 Aug 02 '26
Seconding this. Not all of us want a braindead slop machine thinking for us, and the fact that anyone would says a lot.
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u/mattinternet Aug 02 '26
It's not heroin, just don't use it. I avoid it every day lol
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u/rei-emi Aug 02 '26
u say this like Hank is some special boy, he is literally just a man, a man who is very self interested.
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u/hail_666_satan Aug 02 '26
He's just playing the victim. Totally the same as when Kevin spacey said he was gay to idk make people hate him less or something.
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u/Cheap_Alternative879 Aug 02 '26
It's like your catholic priest getting caught secretly watching proon, during a sermon. Shaaameee, shaameee
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u/Material_Pea1820 Aug 01 '26
I could tell as soon as he made his first Ai video he was uninformed fear mongerer didnāt realize it was because he was addicted to it
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u/kamrlort Aug 01 '26
Iāll likely get crucified for saying that Iāve NEVER liked the Green brothers, not even at the very beginning of their popularity. Both of them come off as superficial, holier-than-thou, āIām-smarter-than-you-areā assholes. Also FUCK Hank again for the total disregard he has for knitting and crafting as a whole, Iām still not over that shit.
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u/stackens Aug 01 '26
lol what he had a knitting controversy?
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u/PrinceVorrel Aug 01 '26
It's barely a controversy for him. SciShow is mostly to blame for the editing/writing of the entire thing for him to do.
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u/kamrlort Aug 01 '26
Did he apologize though? Or did he continue to dig in his heels when people rightfully called him out for treating a women-dominated field as unimportant compared to science or physics, which are predominantly male-focused? I think this video does a better job showing how careless both Hank and SciShow were about this topic.
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Aug 01 '26
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u/that_70_show_fan Aug 02 '26
Your link has your referral ID. Everyone who clicks on or knows your tiktok handle.
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u/meganovice_maker Aug 01 '26 edited Aug 02 '26
the antimasker shit while doing cancer treatment is what lost me
Edit: since I got threats over this I'm adding more context. Hank regularly posted content in his cancer treatment centers unmasked, and justified it by saying that it wasn't required in general areas, only in the infusion areas. John also hosted unmasked events for his Everything is Tuberculosis book tour which became superspreader events, as well as the two of them regularly going unmasked in mask required areas like airports and posting content. Upon criticism their justification was "we did risk analysis and we used to mask." They've scrubbed the tweets but I'll link to one of Hank's many apologies.
https://x.com/i/status/1708690053126602811
also any of yall sending threats are so parasocial and should seek therapy.
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u/kamrlort Aug 01 '26
I TOTALLY FORGOT ABOUT THAT SHIT LMAO
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u/meganovice_maker Aug 01 '26
we love covid and health misinformation with a dash of holier-than-thou ableism
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u/kamrlort Aug 01 '26
Covid misinformation is okay as long as youāre an OG YouTuber who Reddit worships!
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u/SupaSlide Aug 02 '26
Whoa, Hank was anti mask? Glad I donāt follow lol
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u/somethingworthwhile Aug 02 '26
I donāt know that he came out as explicitly anti-mask, but both of the Green brothers did a ton of public appearances fairly early in COVID without masks.
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u/_little_prince_ Aug 02 '26
Can you link anything regarding the anti mask stuff? All Iām finding is him being very pro masking up
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u/Potential-Diver-3409 Aug 02 '26
Itās objectively untrue lol they just didnāt wear masks before it was standardized public health advice
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u/-Release-The-Bats- 29d ago
John also hosted unmasked events for his Everything is Tuberculosis book tour
Irony, thy name is John Green
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u/Sausage_fingies Aug 02 '26
I mean. They started and supported a crowdfunding campaign to fund a maternity hospital for one of the poorest countries in the world. They've made educational content on sci-show and crash course that is well researched and produced, and kept it completely free for educators around the world to use. All of the profit they make with their good.store endeavors and products sold are either donated to charity or used to fund further educational content.Ā
I'm sorry that you see them as superficial and holier than thou and I don't mean to be argumentative, but I think it's indisputable that they're both very smart, capable, and more than anything good people who use their wealth and influence to make the world better.Ā
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u/kamrlort Aug 02 '26
Iām glad that they have contributed their wealth to things that are actually worthwhile! There are countless billionaires who do the same and are also directly responsible for investing in AI tech thatās decimating jobs and creating a huge environmental toll. I personally am not a believer in celebrity worship for any reason, as I donāt know these people and they donāt know or care about me. At the end of the day, theyāre just YouTubers. I also donāt tolerate Covid misinformation, which Hank was more than happy to entertain as well.
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u/Sausage_fingies Aug 02 '26
I totally respect your right to have a differing opinion from mine! And I agree, fans of celebrities tend to develop a parasocially personal relationship with them that doesn't reflect who those people are in reality.Ā
Could you point me toward Hank spreading misinformation about COVID though? As far as I know Hank is quite vocally supportive of masks, and has consistently explained and approached COVID from a scientific lens so I'm not quite sure what you're referring toĀ
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u/ale429 Aug 02 '26
Yeah I felt the same way, I've tired to get into their content since I was like 14 but never could :/
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u/Cow_Slight Aug 02 '26
Oh hey, another hater! ā„ļø I don't think I've met another one before lol. Honestly I never gave Hank a chance after early 2010's Tumblr hyped up John as basically Shakespeare reincarnated, yet I couldn't even finish The Fault in Our Star's. I didn't like it as I was reading it, but kept thinking it must get good at some point, until the fucking everybody clapped at the Anne Frank house scene, which made me just rage quit the book. How completely disrespectful and insensitive.
Petty to take that out on Hank? Perhaps. I just couldn't trust Tumblr's opinion about how amazing Hank also was when their opinion on John was so completely off base to my own.
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u/GrainofDustInSunBeam Aug 02 '26
I never understood why he is so popular. And felt like im the only one lol.
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u/damsonella Aug 02 '26
I found him pretty patronizing before the knitting thing ā ill informed on many topics outside of his usa bubble, but the knitting thing was what tipped me over into unfollowing.
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u/cooltranz Aug 02 '26
I used to run a Bad Movie Club and the local Nerdfighter fan group organized monthly screenings of Tommy Wiseau's The Room. Long story short, they really turned up and supported my club so eventually they just kinda assumed I was also a fan and this was a Nerdfighter event.
I was aware of the Vlog Brothers but by no means a follower let alone a fan. So I had this phase of my life where all these lovely, genuine friends would end our gathering with "DFTBA" hand signal and I had to be like šš¬š "haha thanks"
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u/hail_666_satan Aug 02 '26
I always got vibe he toots his own horn way too much. Also he talks too much. I blocked him on YouTube.
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u/FairyRebelsWild Aug 02 '26
I was a huge fan in high school but haven't watched in years (I haven't watched any of his videos since his 9/11 joke rubbed me the wrong way).
If I remember correctly, I thought he was very environmentally-conscious? How does he justify using AI?
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u/MAD_MrT Aug 02 '26
I have no idea who this dude is but Im pretty sure this is the same guy I saw some clips a few months ago flaming the hell out of AI and the āAI bubbleā now I see this article and I just find the whole situation to be funny as hell.
People really need to stop idolizing youtubers and other kinds of content creators cuz these mfs will do anything for the clicks
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Aug 01 '26
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u/TemporaryElk5202 Aug 01 '26
he admitted and stepped away due to the revolt, the revolt isnt in response to his statement.
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u/OcculticAcid Aug 01 '26
The reason for a āfan revoltā is that many people have trusted Hank Green as a popular science educator and the use of LLMs really harms that reputation.
And if a fan revolt is what keeps him accountable and causes him to work to fix what heās done to his reputation, then thatās a good thing3
u/Noonyezz Aug 01 '26
This message is in response to the fan revolt (which happened after he accidentally left part of a ChatGPT prompt in the script of one of his videos.)
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u/dashboardcomics Aug 02 '26
Welp, pack it up everyone! We hopping on the Kyle Hill train now.
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u/_Pan-Tastic_ Aug 02 '26
Donāt forget MiniMinuteMan for all your archeological needs
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u/proddy Aug 02 '26
I don't know what it is, but whenever I watch one of his videos, doesn't matter what the topic is, he causes my anxiety to increase the longer I watch. I think its because he edits out the natural pauses between sentences or points. Or it could be the intensity of his delivery.
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u/Beagleman11 Aug 01 '26
Iām as anti-AI as anyone in this sub, but Jesus Christ some people need to chill out with the whole crucifixion thing. Hank has been a trusted science educator for years, and the moment he goes a little overboard with AI usage people make him out to be the devil. Is it bad that heās using AI for writing, research, etc? Yeah, probably. Does that mean heās a horrible person? Obviously not. Give the man some grace.
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u/Separate_Marketing36 Aug 02 '26
Seriously, itās fucking disheartening to see the vitriol thrown at him despite all the good heās done in the past 20 years. Does it suck he used AI? Yes. Should people act like he shot a puppy. Absolutely not. He even admitted he had an addiction to using it and is trying to break it.
Instead of people supporting him and engaging in the very much needed conversation of how AI models are designed to be addictive like social media, of course people need their purity tests and think youāre some monster.
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u/bondagepixie Aug 02 '26
āSplitting is a term used to describe a cognitive distortion where a person views situations and people in extremesāseeing them as either all good or all bad, with no middle ground. This type of āblack and white thinkingā is common in Borderline Personality Disorder and often leads to abrupt shifts in mood and opinion about others.ā
Iām a diagnosed borderline, I can tell you first hand that this kind of thinking makes you miserable. It can ruin friendships, ruin relationships, get you fired. Being rights got nothing to do with it, itās bad for you. It sort of squeezes the middle emotions out, until all thatās left is the extremes.
Itās stressful evil times, so I get it I definitely do. But it really only hurtsā¦you. It wonāt an impact on these celebrities at all. Prioritize yourself, yknow. Read up on DBT.
(The royal you, not you OP)
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u/HoodieGalore Aug 02 '26
"Goes a little overboard"? He's talking about it like a fucking addiction! This is not fucking healthy!
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u/PixelatedFrogDotGif Aug 02 '26
He actually does not need anymore grace. He has been increasingly clumsy and irresponsible with what he spends his time on and what he decides to have an opinion on. This isnāt first instance for a lot of peopleā¦ itās kind of a last straw.
Hanks not a monsterā¦. But he is showing that maybe its actually time to step back and let other people lead.
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u/well-informedcitizen Aug 02 '26
Framing it like he got caught cheating and is seeking sex addiction therapy makes no sense and definitely tells me he asked ChatGPT to write him an apology
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u/SmokedOkie Aug 02 '26
I'd hope nobody took him seriously as an education channel, he basically never sited sources outside of mainstream "in the news" articles.
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u/Kesslersyndrom Aug 02 '26
I mean, I don't want to name and shame anyone but looking at what people are writing in this thread, calling him a respected science educator and going as far as
Hank is one of the most thoughtful, generous, and scientifically literate people in the zeitgeist.
I do think people vastly overestimate his importance in science. I think a big part of why he's rubbing me the wrong way is his fans and the blind worship.Ā
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u/Phailjure Aug 02 '26
To be fair, the bar for people "in the zeitgeist" being thoughtful, generous, etc. is on the floor.
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u/Recent-Lemon-9930 Aug 02 '26
I would see an occasional video of his going back a long time and honestly the last just-under-6-months he's looked like shit. Like he reminds me of someone who's been manic in the past but is still on their medication and just hanging on. I didn't link it to AI or anything, but kinda makes sense, even his wife having to tell him off for it.
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u/BertaniWasBehindIt Aug 02 '26
I suppose issuing an apology is better than what other channels have done (cough cough Pretty Much It claiming AI should be used by creatives to ādo the boring stuff they donāt want to do.ā Ugh.)
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u/Xorondras Aug 02 '26
his answer included the line āA better way to say it, and I appreciate the pushback, is a word is a human invention, and human inventions are made by bodies and brains working together.ā LLMs say things like āI appreciate the pushbackā all the time when they hallucinate or otherwise output something weird or wrong and the user corrects it.
You wanna bet he didn't read an AI generated response in this case but is actually casually chatting to ChatGPT so frequently that he did pick up AI speech into his own speech patterns?
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u/Holzkohlen Aug 02 '26
Interesting how even very smart people are susceptible to it all the same, similar to how they are susceptible to social media doomscrolling and brain rot.
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u/Tulipanzo Aug 02 '26
You telling me the guy that invited an "AI researcher" to speak unchallenged for an hour, mouth agape, has a problem with AI.
No wayĀ
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u/Deep-Bet990 Aug 02 '26
If hes doing ai researcg, ai script, ai editing, we literally could throw hank green into a dumpster and make our own and theres no difference,Ā and its all his fault
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u/dirtydev5 Aug 02 '26
his applogy was clearly written by ai. ppl could have seen this coming with how they acted during covid
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u/Chemical-Struggle-13 Aug 01 '26
To save people a click and the cookies. He admits he has a problem, a realization he came to in part because of a conversation with his wife and his brother. He has decided to step back from his work to make curbing his use of LLM's easier. He also admits that he would use it for frequent hits of dopamine.
As someone who only passed several high school classes because of him and his brother's work I hope he can come back from this and cut LLM use from his life.