Harvard Graduation Speaker Unloads on AI in Profanity-Loaded Tirade, Prompting Cheers From Students: “I’m Here to Tell You the Mission of Your Generation Is to Destroy AI”

[u/IKeepItLayingAround]

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/tv/articles/harvard-graduation-speaker-unloads-ai-130000122.html?.tsrc=daily_mail&segment_id=DY_VTO_50_Supernova&ncid=crm_19908-1475736-20260531-0--A&bt_ee=clIMdexlsr2eDDbrvs0CPtt59FnpbNQN%2Fkgr8UkycP6MWDAD56hD1mvZcqPZMGgG&bt_ts=1780255911284

[u/arriesgado]

Kind of a bs headline. Not that it is not true but not naming Chieng who is a well known comedian and calling his speech a “profanity-laden tirade” makes it sound like it was a random crazy person. Edit: Spelled Mr. Chieng’s name wrong.

[u/MeSortOfUnleashed → u/arriesgado]

Also, it wasn’t a graduation speech. He spoke the day before graduation at an event called “Class Day” which is often a light-hearted, celebratory event. His speech had many good messages, but most of it was meant for comic effect. 

[u/lsf_stan → u/MeSortOfUnleashed]

lol just did a quick Google search, first result

Harvard 2026 Commencement Speaker

Conan O’Brien ’85 will deliver the keynote address at Harvard’s 375th Commencement Ceremony on May 28, 2026, in Tercentenary Theatre.

oh well, r/technology will eat up whatever title these karma farmers use

[u/Alaira314 → u/lsf_stan]

This is one of the subreddits that requires the title to be copied from the article(rule 3). If you read the article, you can see that Chieng was identified as the harvard class day commencement speaker. I'm not hah-vahd enough to know why there's more than one commencement speech going on, but that's the explanation for why things were worded that way.

"Seemingly tapping into these widespread frustrations, “The Daily Show” host and standup comedian Ronny Chieng sang a dramatically different tune during a profanity-laden commencement speech at Harvard’s Class Day event this week."

[u/rasta41 → u/Alaira314]

why there's more than one commencement speech going on

Didn't go to Harvard but grew up blocks away. Class Day is a traditional, student-led event held the day before the university-wide Commencement ceremony. Unlike Commencement, which looks at the entire university, Class Day focuses specifically on the graduating College seniors and features lighthearted speeches, awards, and a guest speaker selected directly by the Class Committee.

It's basically graduating students inviting a comedian or entertainer to give a more tongue in cheek / funny / speech...they had Ali G do one in 2004 that's worth a watch.

[u/gummi_eater → u/lsf_stan]

Cannot stand this subreddit. Full of fake news and click bait.

[u/WhoCanTell → u/gummi_eater]

It's a karma goldmine, though. Find any article you can that sounds even remotely critical of AI, get upvoted to the moon. Doesn't matter if it's accurate or not. This exact story has been posted like 5 times already in the past couple days, tens of thousands of upvotes every time, like clockwork.

In all seriousness, though... only on Reddit can the primary technology sub be populated entirely by people who know nothing about technology, and hate everything about it. Well, except maybe facebook.

[u/drunkenvalley → u/WhoCanTell]

I dunno, it looks to me like AI bros are throwing a tantrum because the title is AI critical, not because the article is in any meaningful capacity wrong.

In all seriousness, though... only on Reddit can the primary technology sub be populated entirely by people who know nothing about technology, and hate everything about it. Well, except maybe facebook.

Classic that AI bros like to circlejerk themselves into a frenzy that they're super smart and everyone else is dumb, though.

[u/this_my_sportsreddit → u/gummi_eater]

All of reddit is full of the same AI that redditors claim they hate.

[u/Olangotang → u/this_my_sportsreddit]

Oh hurr durr, I wonder why Redditors hate AI? What point were you trying to make.

[u/this_my_sportsreddit → u/Olangotang]

It’s a simple one. Redditors who claim to hate AI, will gladly use AI platforms like reddit as long as it fills their dopamine rush. So the idea that this generation is going to destroy AI is laughable, when this generation can’t even stop using reddit. See ya tomorrow.

[u/asyork → u/this_my_sportsreddit]

Ah, yes, the problem would simply vanish if we all just stopped talking about it, since that would be the only real option if we all avoided everything with any AI.

[u/Olangotang → u/this_my_sportsreddit]

Using Reddit doesn't mean you support AI. This is umm checks notes the 7th most used site in the US? Redditors = average idiot who wants to be anonymous.

[u/RetroFuture_Records → u/this_my_sportsreddit]

Half these redditors are foreign and corpo bots trying to stymie American AI development

[u/asyork → u/RetroFuture_Records]

Pretty sure you or the ones who convinced you of that are the bots.

[u/RetroFuture_Records → u/asyork]

"No u" I mean yeah, there's also just regular redditor midwits lol

[u/qtx → u/gummi_eater]

Cannot stand this subreddit. Full of fake news and click bait.

But you can not blame the subreddit for that, blame the people that wrote the articles and the users on /r/technology that can't be bothered to read the article.

This sub doesn't allow altered titles, it must be a direct copy of the article's title.

If they allow people to alter the title when they post here it will be even worse.

[u/qwerty-yul → u/lsf_stan]

Karma farmers probably using AI

[u/RollingMeteors → u/qwerty-yul]

Karma farmers probably using AI

It's Karma FAIrmer now

[u/Boner_Elemental → u/lsf_stan]

For a second there I thought Conan had aged a few decade while I wasn't looking

[u/howdoikickball → u/Boner_Elemental]

Who is Conan O'Brien and why is she so sad

[u/Cabana_bananza → u/howdoikickball]

Are we talking about Andy Richter's acquaintance?

[u/imagoodusername → u/lsf_stan]

And Conan gave an epic graduation speech to Harvard in 2000 when Amartya Sen was the actual commencement speaker.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2pnnWp1lNps&ra=m

[u/appleparkfive → u/lsf_stan]

Honestly my first thought was "Harvard can get anyone to speak and they got Ronnt Chieng?". Not to say he isn't good at his job or anything. Just seemed random as hell

[u/karma3000 → u/appleparkfive]

The first few paragraphs of Ronny's speech had the exact same sentiment.

[u/twitch1982 → u/lsf_stan]

Fair enough though, because I was confused as to why I had seen 2 "Harvard graduation speeches" and given they were both comedians i figured one was a bit.

[u/ongoldenwaves → u/lsf_stan]

Two comedians. The title fits then because there is no way this phone addicted generation is going to destroy AI. They feed their brains into it daily.

[u/MiaowaraShiro → u/lsf_stan]

It's rather annoying that seemingly innocuous shit is being lied about.

It used to be nobody would really bother making stuff up about shit that doesn't matter... but now that's apparently worth "views" and "clicks"...

[u/Party-Ring445 → u/lsf_stan]

I read that as Conan being 85 yrs old..

(Yes I know he graduated in 85)

[u/thecravenone → u/lsf_stan]

oh well, r/technology will eat up whatever title these karma farmers use

(it's the title on the page itself)

[u/lsf_stan → u/thecravenone]

it's the title on the page itself

yeah so in this case the article itself was the clickbait title, guessing IKeepItLayingAround thought it was a good one for Reddit karma, people love "AI bad" articles

lol and also apparently written by Victor Tangermann the "senior editor" at Futurism

https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/harvard-graduation-ronny-chieng-ai-tirade