> I suspect some people in this thread think no one should have this feature

I think this feature should be opt-in rather than opt-out. If its turned on for everyone, it should only promote non-controversial suggestions, like the spelling of "their"/"there"/"they're".

You would probably balk if google docs made "suggestions" to call the war in Ukraine a military exercise. Or if it suggested removing any criticism of the CCP because some people may take offense.

Scolding me for using the word "landlord" here in Australia (where its a gender neutral term) feels to me like the same sort of unwanted intrusion into my mental life. This feature makes me really angry.

What will Google do when Russia or China ask them to add their own set of locality-specific "suggestions" to google docs?

> This feature makes me really angry.

Why? Is it because it's political?

I also experienced a Google's Photos feature I thought should have been opt-in, as it wasn't working well for me (auto-labeling in its early days) - but it didn't make me angry; I simply turned it off. I genuinely would like to know why this change is triggering to so many people, in case my assumption is off the mark (i.e. Google is entering the culture war fray on the "wrong" side)

When I'm sitting alone, thinking, I live in the privacy of my own thoughts. Sometimes I have half formed thoughts that others might not agree with. This is important - you can't have good ideas unless you also have bad ideas, after all.

Sometimes I journal. The piece of paper becomes an extension of my mind. There's a sanctity of that space. It is deeply private, and free because ... well, because thats the point of journaling. Sometimes you have to say the idea wrong to figure out how to say the idea right.

And by "piece of paper", I mean, I type into my computer.

Into this context, google wants to insert itself with woke political opinions on my writing? Or suggestions on how I'm not using an "active voice" enough? No. That comes across like an out of touch, entitled 20 year old in another country is reading over my shoulder while I'm journaling in order to make asinine, inappropriate suggestions about my writing. Or so it can judge my politics. All this, in the sanctity of my own mental palace.

Would you take political advice from a google docs AI? Would you take its advice on what the word 'landlord' really means, in the context of your own community, in another country? I wouldn't. If you want to convince me of your politics, take a stand and make your argument boldly. I need to be able to hear what you say as an argument then feel free to disagree with you. Don't dress up a political campaign as writing advice.

It makes me angry because it feels manipulative. Like you're trying to trick me into replacing my words with your words, in order to advance your political agenda. All administered via an AI that I conveniently can't debate. I'm angry because I don't want to have to be on guard against political manipulation simply in order to have my own thoughts, in the privacy of my own mind - or the extension of my mind called a computer. If I mostly agree with the political stand its almost worse - because I won't notice the manipulation as easily.

I also can't help but wonder what would happen if that stupid, entitled AI gets uppity and disagrees with any of my politics. If Google already has an AI thats reading and judging the political content of what I write, where does that end? Will there be consequences down the road for me if I say the wrong thing in my own journal? Probably not. But I'm not absolutely certain. Maybe I should self censor my own thoughts preemptively just in case? In my own journal?

No. F off. I'd much rather burn google docs out of my life than worry about any of that. Which is a pity, because its otherwise a good product.

What google is failing to understand here is that my computer needs to be an agent of my will. Not an agent of google's. Violating that principle is a betrayal.

You are welcome to use Vim, or Notepad.

Google Docs had always needed an internet connection to work, why aren't you complaining about that?

To compare a service product to a piece of paper is asinine and deluded.

I don’t know what you mean by “service product”. But isn’t “it’s like a piece of paper but better” basically the whole pitch for a word processor like Google docs? Since when is writing not part of Google docs’ core feature set?

Meaning, Google offers Docs to you as a service, not as a consumable. You are not entitled to full control of their product, because that would be antithetical to what a service is; the point of a service is to deal with tasks so you don't have to. Storage, up to date grammar checkers & translators, and now whatever this is; these are all things that Google needs to maintain so you don't have to. The greatest control you could have over these functions is to implement them yourself, and that would defeat the point.

Unfortunately, corporations in their ruthless efficiency, don't take to the deconstructionist argument. It would appeal to a large part of the market to have streamlined templates for legal documents, marketing pitches, etc. These are all per se "pieces of paper" at the end of the day but that's not very useful to think about when 45% of your users keep using the same templates for the same purposes. I would imagine some significant segment of the userbase are politically centric marketing drones, and would love a feature like this. I think they have no taste, and that corporate centrism is a problem, but separate from actual authoritarianism; and focusing on Google misses an opportunity to focus on the root issue.

> I think that corporate centrism is a problem, but separate from actual authoritarianism; and focusing on Google misses an opportunity to focus on the root issue.

What’s the root issue, as you see it?

Docs is incredibly pervasive and changing its defaults would alter how a good number of people think. But that's not even a bad thing, it becomes quite bad when you consider that these changes are being lead more by taste than by ethics. Our social elite have confounded the two - that's the problem. Nobody knows when a word is ethical or not, but the influential certainly know when they are put off by a word. By nature of their influence, many are willing to accept at face value that their "positive" and "inclusive" attitudes are a good thing.

I can see the evangelicism now, but I think it's dumber than that. I really do think they're just competing with Grammarly or trying to streamline some process. Changing Docs isn't going to solve the issue, changing the culture is. The culture of relabeling problems as quirks, toxic positivity; and more importantly the sincere confidence in the feeling of good/right that all that entails.

Thanks for responding like this. I think I agree with what you're saying; though I'd still appreciate it if google docs wasn't walking down this road.

What you're articulating is quite a subtle cultural problem. I don't hear many people naming it or talking about it.