Grammar nerds, assemble—over punctuation. After X user LindyMan (@PaulSkallas) claimed the em dash is a telltale sign of AI, writers and editors across the internet fiercely showed up to defend their favorite long dash.
“A shortcut for detecting if something is written with AI is they all use this symbol ‘—’ throughout the writing,” wrote X user @PaulSkallas. “It’s relatively rare when a human uses it, maybe once or twice, if that. But AI chats love using it. No clue why.”
The post, from Feb. 11., 2025, went viral with 3.7M views, 11K likes, 2.4K reshares, and 890 comments. It included a reshare post from X user @rahiemshabazz, with a video clip and an explainer of what Kendrick Lamar meant when he mentioned “40 acres and a mule” during his Super Bowl performance, and four em dashes in total.
Writers were quick to reject the idea in the comments of @PaulSkallas‘s post. “Nah, a longstanding joke among writers is how many of us are gluttons for the em dash,” replied X user @melissajenna. “Like maybe AI does to, but if it does it’s because it’s trained on human writing.”
“Half my google search history is ‘em dash’ because I can never remember the keyboard shortcut and I’m always looking it up to copy paste,” shot back X user @AnEriksenWife in the comments.
“Someone clearly has never worked as an editor for journalists,” posted X user @robaeprice, resharing the post as well.
X user @nuclearunicorns also couldn’t believe what she’d read. “That’s so wild and I wouldn’t recommend this — I use like 30 em dashes a day and edit stories by humans with dozens,” she admitted.
What is an em dash?
The em dash (—) is quite versatile. According to Merriam -Webster Dictionary, it can “function like a comma, a colon, or parenthesis,” to “set off extra information, such as examples, explanatory or descriptive phrases, or supplemental facts.”
It can also “introduce a clause that explains or expands upon something that precedes it.” And, let’s be real, it helps big blocks of text look nice.
“Just saw someone saying using the em-dash is a sign of something being written by AI, because real people rarely use it,” wrote X user @FullAsMuchHeart. “This is terrible news for everyone like me who has an unhealthy emotional attachment to the em-dash.”
Their post has 2.4M views, 99K likes, 16K reshares, 3.4K shares and 895 comments, sparking more conversation about favorite punctuation marks overall.
“Agreed,” X user @fdigitalis wrote in the comments. “It’s my punctuation mark of choice, after having abandoned the semicolon in my late teens. Any quick-thinking, fragmented speaker and writer depends on it to maintain a shred of structure. It wasn’t until I learned advanced typography that I fully embraced its charms. Leave it alone—it didn’t deserve this cruel mischaracterization.”
The em dash differs from its shorter counterpart, the en dash, in that the latter is “most often used between numbers, dates, or other notations to signify ‘(up) to and including.’”
Merriam Webster also disagrees with @PaulSkallas‘s argument that real humans don’t use em dashes. The legendary dictionary boldly states that “the en dash is the least loved of all” and that “it’s not easily rendered by the average keyboard user” because of complicated keyboard shortcuts.
Is an em dash really a sign of AI?
The jury is still out as to whether an em dash is really an indicator of AI usage. Neither AI developers nor grammar experts have made any official statement on the matter.
Wealthy Affiliate created a blog post which mentioned that “em dashes are used to make writing sound more interesting” and that “AI loves them because it ‘thinks’ they are flexible and help writing sound more natural,” but with no real authoritative reasoning or evidence.
AI Phrase finder also claims that sites like ChatGPT favor em dashes “to expand on a point or to make a tangential point” but also admits that it’s a direct result of human training, because humans favor the em dash also.
X users had their own reasons on the controversial hot take. “The reason AI chat bots use the em dash a lot is because AUTHORS use the em dash a lot,” explained @jennifercarolyn. “AI learned how to write by being fed works stolen from authors. Super fun for all of us.”
“No, using an em dash a lot isn’t a sign of AI,” wrote X user @galacticidiots, “Because the em dash is not punctuation, it’s a vibe. It’s a feeling. You don’t use it because it makes grammatical sense — you use it because your heart tells you to. AI couldn’t possibly do it well because it lacks one.”
Em dash fans are ready to fight for their favorite punctuation mark
Writers and journalists across X caught wind of the controversial post, and were quick to come to the punctuation mark’s defense.
“What we’re not about to do is let AI have the em dash,” wrote X user @moniza_hossain, resharing @PaulSkallas‘s post. “The em dash belongs to human writers. It’s our emotional support punctuation mark.” The sentiment resonated across the social media platform, with 708.9K views, 27K likes, and 4.1K reshares.
“I have to delete some of them because I feel bad having one in every sentence,” X user responded @sgonzalesauthor in a comment on the post.
“First ‘delve’’ and now the em dash, it’s like real yappers can’t even pontificate anymore without being accused of being ai,” posted X user @morgan_sung.
“The precious em dash has done more for me as a writer and human being than all of ChatGPT combined,” added X user @heyaimsarah.
X user @ULTRAGLOSS made the point that if anything, a lack of em dash usage is proof of an AI-produced piece.
“I literally write full time for a living and im addicted to the em dash,” the posted. “if there aren’t at least 3 in my stories then you can start suspecting AI.”
The Daily Dot has reached out to @PaulSkallas via X DM for comment.
