If you shoot an arrow and it goes real high, hooray for you.

this was the question:

"What kind of AI software did your school district use to ban books?"

The woman  i asked responded quickly and politely in her email – they used ChatGPT to help determine which books should be confiscated from children and teenagers in order to comply with Iowa's new neofascist law.

Not long after being first assigned to aggregate the story, i noticed that in our source article, the woman only said they used 'AI software' to help ban these books. She didn't specify which AI software, so i asked. Then she answered, and i felt good about it. very righteous for fighting a good fight or something.

Then i asked her if she wanted to comment on how ChatGPT gave me different answers than the ones they got. She clarified her position, and it made me very sad.

From what i could infer, she doesn't like her state's law, either. But she is obligated to comply in some way, so the easiest way to technically "review" books is to ask ChatGPT if they contain anything 'illicit.' Quarantine those books, and you fulfilled your state mandated duty. But that duty is still banning books for children.

Anyway i wrote it  up as best i could. All of this technically counts as journalism, and we published her answer before anyone else, as far as i can tell. Since then it's become one of the more viral stories i've ever written. And virality counts as success right now. Success for me, at least. Because i have no idea how that school district is handling the newfound national attention, a magnifying lens trained on them partially thanks to me. i have no idea if my work will get this woman fired for the undue negative press coverage.

But Before the article came out, i emailed her back to thank her for her candor, and tried to let her know that i can't imagine the situation she and all the other educators are dealing with right now. And i'm worried she will lose her job. She hasn't responded.

i beat out every other writer to answer a very basic question this week, and maybe that will ruin someone's livelihood. More than likely it won't, but the odds are definitely higher than they were before we published their answer to that one question.

ironically, it reminds me of the final scene in Paris is Burning—the documentary about queer, trans, and drag communities in New York City during the late 80s . You know, the people who never stopped getting killed for living, and now it's just going and going and getting worse and more people are getting killed. And the others are banning  books again. they're banning human living put into words what the fuck is going on

In the last scene, the matriarch of one of the drag families is putting on her makeup ahead of a show

, or maybe she is taking off her makeup after a show.

i can't remember, but she is talking about her life, whenever this was. And this is what she says - she says:

I always had hopes of being a big star. But as you get older, you aim a little lower. Everybody wants to make an impression, some mark upon the world. Then you think, you've made a mark on the world if you just get through it, and a few people remember your name. Then you've left a mark. You don't have to bend the whole world. I think it's better to just enjoy it. Pay your dues, and just enjoy it. If you shoot an arrow and it goes real high, hooray for you.

And i wonder if that woman will get fired or something. She isn't going to respond to my last email, and i'm not going to message her again. i am not going to keep track of her career, because i'm not.

and i feel like i shot an arrow and it went real high.    hooray for me

(((EC)))