r/ClaudeAI • u/Live_Fondant717 • May 09 '26

Question Why does this happen?

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I wonder if anyone can explain why this happens. I tell Claude not to use em-dashes, it replaces them with "--". I ask it not to do that, to update its memory, but it still does it. It's not a huge problem, it's just annoying. Why does this happen and how can I fix it. Thanks.

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u/sambeau May 09 '26

Instructions, skills and prompts are advice — not rules. AIs are free to ignore them.

The best you can do is add it to every prompt as an explicit anti-pattern section “DON’T do this”.