People involved (names changed): me (22F), Nick (early–mid 20s, M), and his girlfriend Sarah (early 20s, F). They were together around 2 years and lived together. We all attend the same university in a small European country.
I draw as a hobby and sometimes post my art on private social media. Nick, someone I casually know, asked me to draw his dog. I agreed.
We discussed the style and color palette in advance. I intentionally avoided yellow tones bc i don’t really like to use it. I sent sketches and progress updates, he approved everything. After I sent the final artwork, Nick ran my finished drawing through an AI tool, told it to “make it better” and sent me the AI version back (noticeably more yellow and with a different mood) and asking me to redo my work to match what the AI made. I felt disrespected and Instead of talking it out calmly or refusing the request, I chose to post about it on a public art subreddit. asking which version would they prefer. The post went viral and Sarah somehow found out. Maybe Nick showed her my art idk.
Important context: Sarah is extremely anti-AI in art. Activist-level. She recently participated in protests against AI, believing it steals artists’ work and destroys creative jobs. My post essentially confirmed that her boyfriend was using AI in a way she deeply disagrees with.
According to mutual friends, she exploded. She screamed at Nick, threw things at him, posted publicly calling him a traitor and an asshole, packed her belongings, and moved back to her parents. They hardly broke up.
After that, Nick and his friends said "You could’ve handled it privately instead of airing it online", "You escalated a minor issue into public drama", "You destroyed a serious relationship for internet validation’
Now the whole university knows. Even the dean’s office even called me in to discuss the situation.
Even if Nick was wrong, did I still act like an asshole by letting the internet escalate this into a breakup and a public mess?
The answer to why the university might’ve intervened: we have a VERY SMALL university and the situation began to escalate in student chats and on a social network dedicated to our university. I was called by the dean’s office of my specialty, there are only 43 of us students, so they could intervene
P.S. I may’ve missed something (not intentionally), ask in if you need clarification on anything.
NTA. Nick is the one who hid who is he from his gf. He is responsible for the break up not you. He is making you responsible for it.
I don’t understand why the university got involved.
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“Even the dean’s office even called me in to discuss the situation.”
INFO: why?!
NTA. What Nick did was very wrong and backstabbing in a way. Art is a dying form of media all thanks to all this artificial intelligence taking peoples jobs and trying to take over the art world. As an hobby artist myself, that really hurts me to see people using computer generated art and not drawing something by hand.
Half of the products in our stores have AI design, it’s crazy
INFO Did Nick pay you for the drawing? Did he give any indication that he wanted more yellow or a different style?
I can sort of understand people that can’t draw using AI to show what they mean. But in this case, Nick would have had to prompt the AI wkth his wishes. And so he could have given those prompts to you instead.
If your university in a small European country is so small that the dean gets involved when two students break up, you need to find a bigger university. And maybe a bigger country.
ETA: What did this dean say to you?
NTA, what Nickdid was disrespectful. Why didn’t he just ai the picture completely himself.
Your talent, time and passion went into this project. To have it thrown back in your face like that is wrong.
Ai is robbing people of talent, initiative and being able to think and process for themselves.
In years to come we will all have marshmallow brains.
It’s extremely condescending and demeaning of Nick to even do that. I’d definitely feel very insulted by that if I were in your position. And not only that, he disrespected what his girlfriend stood for behind her back and although her reaction might’ve been a little over the top with all the provided context, there might’ve been some underlying issues that they were already facing.
You did nothing wrong, you were practically insulted and wanted the internet’s opinion on the matter. The fact that it even escalated to a breakup again hints to underlying issues already present in their relationship.
NTA he did something he know his GF hates. He’d have been found out eventually. Sounds like the cracks were already there if she was ready to dump him for this. Blaming you is just a convenient way for him to dodge blame and misogynistic thinking to take over.
He wasn’t thinking about his relationship when he did what he did. If I knew my girlfriend was that against AI I’d be damned if I used to “improve” the art of an actual artist. NTA dude should have used his critical thinking skills.
So you made a public reddit post about a situation – with the other person hurt that you addressed it publicly instead of privately -, you think you might be the AH in the situation, and your solution was to make another public reddit post about it?
Either this is made up or you really need to improve your critical thinking skills
Sounds made up as fuck