A SORT OF DECLARATION
Although I'm a leftist, I consider myself more of a Debordian, or perhaps somewhere between Debord and Mark Fisher. I believe capitalism and neoliberalism have already won the battle. Nothing seems to exist outside of them, or, as Fisher argues, it's become increasingly difficult to imagine something outside of them, let alone something that could take their place.
So what's left?
Perhaps the answer is to use their own tools against the cultural and socioeconomic order they sustain.
WHAT 99% OF PEOPLE WILL GET WRONG ABOUT ME
I'm not a comic artist. My main objective isn't to draw (although I do it every day) or to make a comic. I want to change culture. MVNDY is a fairly typical science fiction/supernatural story, but all its main characters are queer. It's about bringing a piece of dissidence into the mainstream ("dissidence becomes mainstream," if it needs a cooler name). So I'm using the mechanisms of the current cultural hegemony to change it from within. I want MVNDY movies, toys, and every kind of merchandise I can imagine. I want it to spread like a virus. And suddenly, there's a queer object in every conservative's son's bedroom.
I want to transform what society considers normal, desirable, and culturally legitimate. Not just put an "I support LGBTQ+" button on my profile and think I'm doing some great revolutionary work.
I'm not saying there's no value in niche or more anti-mainstream works of art, but I don't think they have as much cultural impact, and when they do, it can take decades. I think this approach could create a much bigger shock.
AI VS NO AI
The same can be applied to AI. I like to draw, but I really don't give a shit if someone uses AI to make their drawings. They might learn something from it, but it's nothing compared to putting in the effort and drawing yourself. In the end, drawing is a way of thinking, so if you let AI think for you, you aren't learning much. And I'm not a moral preacher, so I'm not going to go out of my way to scold people about how "this is bad for you, blah blah blah." As an architect, what really bothers me is the ecological impact. But since AI is becoming integrated into almost every mainstream digital tool, many of which are practically required for work, I don't think things are going to change much. I just hope the damage can be mitigated. Complicity isn't an excuse to abandon responsibility, though. If you want to point fingers at me, I'm fine with that.
So I have no problem vibe coding my site. And this is the other thing that 99% of people will also get wrong about me. Coding isn't a hobby for me, and although I find it very interesting, I'm not interested in learning it fully in the near future. MVNDY is about giving a platform to the comic, independent Chilean artists, and underground Chilean DJs. It's a means to an end.
If you want to pretend it's the '90s and recreate some sort of Amish digital paradise, I have no problem with that. Go ahead. Seems like a cool idea and a cool place, but don't pretend you're making some big change with it. As the Italian architectural critic Manfredo Tafuri might have argued, this whole "using AI" versus "not using AI" debate is a little game. He compared the architecture of Alvar Aalto and Le Corbusier. Personally, I much prefer Aalto's architecture. I hate almost everything about Le Corbusier. Aalto's designs were incredibly precise, detailed, and concerned with the well-being of their inhabitants. But Aalto didn't have as much to say about society, at least not in the same way Le Corbusier did. In the end, Le Corbusier's projects were operating within much larger historical and ideological forces, and it was the Modern Movement and the International Style that helped shape the architectural culture of the twentieth century.
I don't want to convince people. I don't want to make political arguments. What I want, as Antonio Gramsci might have put it, is to alter the cultural environment in which those arguments take place. And I'll use every tool at my disposal to achieve that.
Don't get me wrong, MVNDY is entirely created and drawn by me (no AI assistance), but that's because I want full control over it. Every word, every line. If I'd wanted to use AI, I could've finished this project months ago. Instead, it's going to take me months to finish it.
Maybe I won't succeed. Maybe I'll have wasted my time and exposed myself needlessly (especially in anti-AI spaces). But this is a high-risk, high-reward game, and I'm more than ready to play it. I think the main difference between me and the people who can't stop themselves from lecturing me is that I'm aware of my own contradictions, rather than pretending to occupy some position of moral superiority.
PD: AI would've written a much stronger argument.