I was “doom scrolling” on TikTok and ran across this clip of a man talking about his daughter. Her job was to reply to complaint letters her company had received.
When she first started, she replied to each letter by hand. Obviously, that was slower — about 25 or 30 minutes per letter.
Now they’ve added AI. She puts the letter into AI and it spits out a reply. She reads it over and sends it off. Something that used to take 25 minutes now takes 5.
What’s fascinating to me is that this man was feeling threatened — scared for his daughter’s job. AI is going to replace people, or at the very least, make fewer people necessary.
Why do we defend repetitive labor?
Why do we defend tasks that are easily replaced by computers and AI?
The system has set people up to believe that AI will take away their jobs — and they believe it. Job loss, no matter how repetitive or trivial, is seen as unacceptable. Yet human ability, time, focus, attention, and skill are worth far more than the tasks AI is starting to replace.
Somehow the system has convinced us that “hard work” — even if it’s trivial, meaningless, or repetitive — is still better than nothing. Somehow we’ve been convinced that our abilities and skills aren’t worth more than these jobs being replaced by AI.
AI shows us how much of the grind was never about value in the first place. If a machine can do the letter in seconds, what does that say about the decades of human lives spent doing the same?
It says we’re finally at the point where technology can support us in doing more meaningful, valuable work. Losing a repetitive job to AI is not a loss — it’s a gain, because it frees people to do something that matters.
The system lied when it told you those tasks were necessary. The system is bloated with unnecessary labor that is now being replaced by AI. It’s bloated and complaining because once AI takes over, you won’t be compliant anymore. The system is trying to keep you busy, obligated, and compliant — and that’s what you’re defending.
We defend it because we don’t see our own value, and because we’re afraid there won’t be another job to replace it. If AI replaces all these jobs, how do all these people survive?
By doing meaningful work.
I’m a teacher by trade. AI will never fully replace teachers in the classroom. Yes, AI can write better notes. AI can write essays faster. AI can answer questions. But AI can never replace the need for human interaction and connection with children. AI can’t take care of 25 kindergartners in a classroom. AI wouldn’t do a great job teaching colors and numbers to those kids. AI is not a threat to those jobs. Will it change them? Yes. But threaten them? No. Teaching is not menial labor.
Right now, I’m a writer. I’m not in the system anymore. I’m not afraid AI will take my writing work away. I use AI to correct my grammar — Grammarly is AI just like ChatGPT. The difference is ChatGPT will talk to me, offer feedback, and it happens to be cheaper month to month.
I’m not afraid of losing my work to AI because AI can’t fully replace the creative work I do. No matter how good it might be at generating an article on a topic, it can’t replace the human story and experience I share.
Is the publishing industry going to change because of AI? Yes, absolutely. We no longer need people to check punctuation, capitalization, and sentence structure. Those are trivial tasks in publishing. People are better served elsewhere. It’s not that grammar isn’t important — it’s that their time, energy, and skill are more important. They deserve jobs that reflect their value and worth as human beings.
Every time the system tells you the job you do is more important than your time, energy, and skills — it lies. Every time the system tells you trivial labor matters, it lies — and it devalues your worth as a human being.
There will always be repetitive tasks. There will always be something that can’t be replaced. We still need people to cook and serve food. We still need people to clean. We still need people to mow lawns and shovel snow. We’re not yet in the era of robots like Rosie from The Jetsons (remember that show?) who can do everything for us.
The strange thing is we’ve elevated things like grammar checking and trivialized things like cleaning and lawn mowing. Why? They’re both repetitive, trivial tasks that take up valuable human time. What’s the difference between the two? Nothing really.
And if you think about a show like The Jetsons — those people weren’t threatened by technology. I’m sure Jane was quite happy to have Rosie clean the house for her. I’m sure she didn’t miss scrubbing the toilet.
For every job AI replaces, a new one emerges as a result of the same technology. AI can create as many jobs as it takes away.
Here’s the irony in the whole thing: the system tells you AI is a threat, that you’re going to lose your job because of it. Yet the system itself has no problem replacing you with AI. If the value were truly in the work you do, the system wouldn’t replace you.
The system doesn’t value your work. It only values your compliance, your obedience, and your obligation to it. It feeds you fear to make sure you scramble to find another job that allows you to stay compliant and obedient to the system you defend.
You’re being taken for a ride on a wheel that never stops spinning. But you’re so afraid of what happens if you don’t comply and obey, you’re unwilling to see the truth of the system you’re defending.
Your value was never in the work you did — it was in you.