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10 AI-Generated Red Flags

“AI Made Me Do It” Writing Prompts Part 8

A red flag is a warning sign of a potentially concerning behavior or personality trait; for relationships, they often indicate underlying problems such as trust issues, power imbalances, or lack of emotional awareness.

For writers, red flags can serve as starting points for creating intriguing characters with dark secrets, conflicted motivations, and sources of potential tension and suspense in your stories. For today’s segment of the promptilicious series “AI Made Me Do It,” I’ve asked ChatGPT to generate some unique “red flags” that can be used as writing prompts.

Check out Parts 1–7 of “AI Made Me Do It” for more prompts:

Part 1: Prompts About Artificial Intelligence Part 2: Writing Prompts About Love Part 3: These Prompts are LIES Part 4: Springtime Prompts Part 5: Prompts Against Humanity Part 6: AI-Generated Plot Twists Part 7: Red Herrings for your plot

How This Works

• Use the following prompts to write anything you’d like: a short story, flash fiction, poem, article, creative nonfiction, etc. Use the prompt in its entirety or change whatever you’d like; it’s up to you!
• Submit your response here at Promptly Written (please follow the submission guidelines) where it will be edited by yours truly, Casey Lawrence**, to other any publication, or self-publish it.
• If you publish your story somewhere on Medium other than PW, make sure to include a link to the prompt at the bottom of your story and tag me @clawrenc so that I don’t miss out!
• Have fun!

“AI Made Me Do It”: 10 AI-Generated Red Flags

1. The character has an extensive collection of personal belongings that clearly do not belong to them and were likely stolen.
2. The character possesses an inexplicable talent for turning any conversation into an intense debate, regardless of the topic.
3. The character insists on bringing their pet goldfish on dates.
4. The character has an unusual talent for finding lost or misplaced items, often locating them in the most improbable and unexpected places, earning a reputation as a “finder”.
5. The character seems charming and charismatic, but their words and actions consistently undermine or belittle the people around them.
6. The character has an insatiable appetite for extreme couponing and spends hours each day searching for discounts and deals.
7. The character eats everything with their hands, including soup.
8. Despite having a seemingly perfect life, the character constantly engages in risky behaviors that put their safety and relationships at risk.
9. The character secretly records all their phone calls without the other character’s consent and maintains an extensive archive of all their conversations.
10. The character insists on wearing an extensive costume from a different historical era every day, regardless of the occasion.

ChatGPT really struggled with this assignment, and it took many attempts to generate this list. Many of the “red flags” it suggested throughout the process were actually symptoms of mental illness, autism, or OCD, including “compulsively rearranges objects in their environment,” “collects unusual objects, like bottle caps,” “forms attachment to inanimate objects,” or “follows a strict schedule,” as well as completely beige flags like “has a fascination with true crime” or “has the ability to understand the emotions of animals.”

I guided ChatGPT to create the list above and the bonus list below using carefully-worded prompts and then selected only those which are actually “red flags” that will make for interesting characters.

Bonus

Here are ten AI-generated ‘micro-prompts’ using the same criteria. You can use them as part of your response to the prompts above, or as writing prompts in their own right!

1. Takes an unusual number of selfies
2. Never returns shopping carts
3. Talks poorly about their exes
4. Uses excessive air quotes
5. Has a shrine dedicated to a celebrity
6. Leaves roommates passive-aggressive notes
7. Speaks in rhymes unintentionally
8. Uses an excessive amount of emojis
9. Talks in the third person
10. Refuses to wear shoes

If you have topics you’d like me to suggest to ChatGPT for generating writing prompts, put them in the comments!

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**To respect my time, note that I will only edit small issues, such as minor spelling and punctuation mistakes, tags, or formatting. If a story requires extensive editing, I will leave a Private Note and reject the piece for you to edit. You may resubmit a rejected story once it has been properly edited according to the submission guidelines.