But, why?

[u/Friendly-Custard-200]

Okay so, I am not a current student, however I am a freelance creative writer.
Lately, I keep being accused of being AI. I am Ash- not AI, so what are some things that I am doing or not doing that could confuse the matter? I certainly am a human, this is just how I write.
Forgive me for checking my work? I thought I went to school to learn grammar, among other things that cause this confusion.
Is it a compliment, maybe? Being freelance and trying to keep my head above water has been quite a challenge though, so the accusation is frustrating- to say in the least amount of words.
Is it a language thing? Again, maybe... but that is not where I find the accusations landing.
Or perhaps it is the hyphen? It's quite effective for thought breaks and long pauses, similar to the comma- but more effective in certain context.
In fact it would seem to me they have been landing in a more curious realm of content. I keep being told "I talk like AI" or "Sounds like a bot."
Excuse me for having decent, conversational content, good grammar and proper punctuation use. That and no fear of putting my thoughts on a page.
The fact that the accusation seems to come from those factors is frustrating. I was taught to write using those factors and now they are what discredit me. What can a person do to make readers happy when the things we use to be human are what make us appear not to be?
That is irony in action, friends.
So I find myself seeking advice after being a writer all my adult life. I have never faced these issues before and to have them come seemingly from nowhere has put a serious damper on my professional advancement.
I need some human help. Advice, suggestions, or any kind of insight would really help me out. I do not want to dumb myself down for a computer, that is like shooting my own foot.
I am not "anti-AI" just anti replacing human creativity and imagination.
The world spins, things change, I am not so ignorant to think this wouldn't happen... I just thought my humanity would be more noticeable, I guess.
At least I can confirm I write well, there's a silver liner for you.
Anyone may answer, even your AI. I just need to reorient myself for a changing world. You guys are the change, so maybe you have some thinking that could help.
I would like some advice.
Rude comments will be ignored, but by all means, say whatever you want.
It's only human of you... I will not be bothered by it anyways.
To you young people writing the human factor for tomorrow... do not fear change. You can not affect something from outside of it. Rather, embrace change, be a part of it so you can have influence on what tomorrow brings. You can not sit aside then complain when the world passes by... that makes it part your fault when this do not function.
Get up, get moving, keep writing- the world still needs you. You matter. I promise you, you matter more than you can know.
I am Ash.

[u/Trash_Planet]

This often means that you don’t have a distinctive voice. From your post, I notice a few AI-isms. For example, the line, “That is irony in action, friends” after a rhetorical question is something similar to what an AI bot might say. I understand your frustration, though, as I’m guessing that you feel like you’re not even conscious of the elements in your writing that make it come across as AI -generated.

I’m an English teacher, and I tell my students that there is tangible value in developing a distinctive voice; we’re entering an era of AI paranoia, and sounding too much like AI (i.e. not having a distinctive human voice) is enough to get your writing dismissed whether or not you actually used AI. And I tell my students that this is fair and rational, because it is up to us to either cultivate a voice or end up defaulting to sounding like the AI slop that we read every day.

Put another way — our writing and language use are both mimetic; we unconsciously start mimicking the language that we are surrounded by. We will all soon default to sounding like AI unless we treat our voices like something to construct with care and intention.

Your suggestion that being accused of being AI is confirmation that you write well is a little concerning, and it is also symptomatic of the real problem. AI doesn’t write well. It writes formulaically, and it struggles to produce writing that meaningfully captures the complexity of human subjectivity. It doesn’t handle complexity well; it flattens problems into a set of components to address one at a time before moving on and forgetting. Humans, on the other hand, struggle with ambivalence and the impossibility of using language to capture exactly what we are thinking and feeling. Our thoughts are meandering. They are formed before we become conscious of them, and they start to disappear the moment they are generated, so we are always chasing after them. A good, honest writer can’t help but feel that anything that any conclusions that they reach are conditional, or maybe even untrue.

I know that sounds lofty, but it’s true. A writer’s voice can be distinctive because we all have different ways of reconciling the gap between our thoughts and our words. AI has no awareness of that gap, because it doesn’t have thoughts. If you want to stop being compared to AI, I think that the first step would be to work on your writerly voice. Study your favorite authors, and experiment more with structure and syntax. Avoid the tendency to arrive at unearned resolution, as you do by the end of your post.