“Son, I Hate My Job”

I have an ever-abiding memory of my father, one that haunts me to this day. I remember, early one morning, bumping into him as I made my way to the bathroom. Through my bleary eyes, I could see such weary eyes, and with a look that I can still feel now, he said, “Son, I hate my job.” Adding, whatever you do, “Don’t become like me.” Yet, history has a habit of repeating itself, and despite my best efforts, I am dangerously close to becoming that man.

Ragged Trousered, Digitally Bound

I am a ragged trouser philanthropist trapped in a hell of my own making, a purgatory of points and picas, not that we use them any more. A rhyming metaphor for all that has passed. I pine for the good old days before this became tedious and just a bore. A time before Photoshop, for days of yore. When good enough was never good enough. It’s not just youth I desire; I don’t belong here; I’ve done my time, but just like Kafka, what was my crime?

Old Dogs, New Tricks, and AI

I envy the enthusiasm of the young and their naivety, too. Yet still, I pity. My wisdom is irrelevant to these young pups. Oh, to know so little; you are ignorant of that fact. All you see is just an old dog. Move along; no new tricks to see here. I laugh, for the joke’s on you — just like me, you will get old before your time. At least I had a career, will you? Or will the technology you so eagerly adopt eat you, too?

First, They Came for the Snappers

And now AI is the newspaper’s pantomime villain, but underestimate the threat at your peril, for when you dance with the devil, don’t be surprised if he puts his hand up your skirt. While I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiments of the “Make it Fair” campaign and the silent “This What We Want?” album, I can’t help but feel a little sickened, too. Where were you when we needed you?

“when you dance with the devil, don’t be surprised if he puts his hand up your skirt”

The sight of a band of multi-millionaire artists banging on about AI’s exploitation of their craft, whilst noble, only succeeds in me mentally playing the world’s tiniest violin while reciting a poem in my head — “First They Came” by Pastor Martin Niemöller. Years ago, when late football deadlines succeeded in turning an overpriced toy into the engine of newsgathering, and the digital camera made its analogue brethren obsolete overnight — we snappers warned the scribblers that the writing was on the wall. That their time would come. But no one listened.

Photoshop for Words

Photoshop, digital cameras and mobile phones revolutionised editorial photography and photography in general. But not for the better. Even so, being young and at the start of this career, I had no choice but to run with it, even though I could see the storm was already gathering. In forty years, I’ve seen hundreds of years of change. None of it has been good for photography as a profession. I’m pretty sure we joked about what happens when there is a Photoshop for words. No creatives are laughing now. In fact, almost no one is.

“No creatives are laughing now. In fact, almost no one is.”

For an analogy for all that ails the plight of creatives, look no further than the digital camera, where photographers saw a tool, the accountants saw a way to save money, and in the wrong hands, it was deadly. Yes, at first, it was blisteringly expensive, but boy, it saved dosh. No more film and pesky jobs for those who did the processing and scanning. No more couriers or film sales assistants; the end of an ecosystem. And no one shed a tear. All “For want of a nail” — all for nothing. All because the accounts could cut staff and corners.

Binary Salvation

The irony that I am using a binary language to construct this piece is not lost on me. However, the noughts and ones make up for the deficiencies in my own language. Thanks in part to a dreadful education in an even worse comprehensive but mainly due to my dyslexia (it hadn’t been invented when I was at school, so I was just branded as thick), if I were using my native tongue and the old analogue typewriter, my thoughts would just come out as gobbledegook. Thankfully, I now have a voice.

So, when it comes to writing, I owe computers, word processors and even AI, to some extent, a huge debt of gratitude. They levelled the playing field and gifted me that voice. They help me leap the hurdles of spelling, grammar and punctuation that education left insurmountable. However, the words and ideas are all mine. Computers are just digital chisels that help me chip away at the unstructured granite of my constructs and arrive at smooth, sculpted words. The tools of my expression. But what of when they become the tools of my repression?

The Creative Reversal

Call me a woke warrior or a loony lefty if you wish. It makes no odds to me. But in my experience, accountants, the modern mill owners, will always take the path of least resistance. Time and time again, as far as the worker is concerned, modernity is the law of ever-decreasing circles and ever-decreasing returns. More with less. Less pay, more work, more stress, less hope — lest we forget. Yet, we do it every time. Do you remember what Einstein said about insanity?

In the End, We All Wear Rags

Unfortunately, I can offer no solutions. Just as the design of family cars is bound by the laws of aerodynamics and all end up looking the same, so too does any system constricted by the rigid philosophy of capitalism. When the tools of creativity are turned on their heads and become weapons in the accountants’ never-ending war on workers, we are all doomed. What was meant to bring us creative freedom will instead enslave us — until, in the end, we are all just ragged trouser philanthropists.