As a self-proclaimed, uncultured representative of my generation, I use em dashes!

I am somehow aware that the em dash has become a hallmark of chatbots’ writing—after all, apparently, younger generations are retiring this punctuation mark.

The fatal mistake we are making is the result of a death loop where people have started taking the “path of least resistance” when it comes to texting, which has become a main source of communication (Gustafson 1). Take the comma for example—it’s right on the bottom of the keyboard and convenient to type. Why not use that instead?

An em dash requires the whole effort of memorizing a complex keyboard shortcut on a computer…or typing two hyphens? No, that seems way too difficult—I’d rather restructure my entire train of thought because I’d never, ever think to use autocorrect to my advantage.

Chatbots that have analyzed formal writing, dissertations, and books (written by humans!) can write an entire essay in two seconds. Typing an em dash is no big feat—chatbots learned from the best of humans’ writing. But because em dashes have become a classic for teachers or online detectors to flag as written by artificial intelligence (AI), they’ve been going further extinct among students.

It’s not time to retire the em dash—it’s time to retire the idea that punctuation marks are reserved only for AI because maybe, just maybe, they existed before AI ever did.

Works Cited

Vara, Vauhini. “Humans vs. Bots — Who Does the Em Dash Better?” New York Times, 10 June 2026, www.nytimes.com/2026/06/10/books/review/em-dash-chatbot-human-language.html.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/10/books/review/em-dash-chatbot-human-language.html