Venting About AI Voices

Sunday, My Day, was more my day than any Summer Sunday. I did not need to water the garden beds; I had the entire day to myself. We walked early so that I’d be home for my Zoom call with my fellow BC stutterers. I hadn’t seen them for four months. My UK group has emerged as the most important support group for me. However, I learned about SPACE yesterday from my group, and I have written to them.

SPACE is invested in advocacy, and so I wrote to the executive director to ask about joining with anyone at SPACE interested in advocacy around the use of AI generated voices answering phone lines of corporations, hospitals, pharmacies, etc.

Then we had lunch before going to Rollo Park to watch the quarter finals of a slow pitch baseball league. It was something I’d wanted to do since moving here but never did. So finally, I’ve done it, but sadly my diet precluded the hot dog I love to eat when watching baseball. There was a team from Gabe, but most were from Nanaimo and there was at least one Indigenous team.

We stayed just under an hour, and then we went to Elder Cedar to walk the trail on an exquisite afternoon. There were quite a few people on the trail, so it was fun to stop and chat with them. When we got back to the car, I took my left show off because my whole lower left leg was killing me. I’m icing my heel tonight!

When we got home, I headed you know where: the spa. It was lovely but short. It was in the full glare of sunlight, and it was just too much heat, so I was quick. And My Day was done, except for my favourite part of every Summer day: dinner and a movie.

In the evening, I wrote this FIRST DRAFT for STAMMA, although the invitation to submit was rather vague on objectives.

I’ve had three heart attacks, I have severe asthma and a seizure disorder, and when the seizure disorder began, it came with a severe speech impairment. My preferred forms of communication are emails and notes on paper. I use a telephone referral service to make telephone calls. But—and this is a big ‘but’ for me—I can communicate orally with people with whom I feel very secure and comfortable. But when I do, I have a very severe stammer that, in my case, is more about blocks than repetition of initial phonemes.

The greatest threat to my health, however, is that I live alone, and on an island with minimal infrastructure, and I have no family. I depend, therefore, on a personal alarm that works with my landline to a service that can communicate with me via a speaker in my home. Recently, when I pushed my alarm, an AI-generated voice responded.

It asked how it could help me. The good human responders always begin with questions to which the answer is ‘yes,’ or ‘no.’ I tried to speak but couldn’t, and when that happens, I go for what I call, ‘key words’—single words that convey a lot of meaning. But by the time I tried to get a word out, it asked me the same question again, and that became an endless loop. I had to hang-up.

Since then, I’ve been contacting organizations and corporations using AI operators, to add to the contact page a number for speech and hearing-impaired people. I have had friends negotiate personal contacts for me within the personnel of agencies and organizations that are important to me and that have telephone systems that I can’t negotiate.

The problems I am having are going to get worse. AI is growing at an incredible rate. Things that enable corporations to save money by reducing staff become popular quickly. Apple’s generated voice asks you questions and then tells you how to answer, requiring you to say one of any number of offered words. And you must answer quickly, or the question gets asked again and you are in another loop.

Some who stammer can become somewhat socially isolated, particularly teens who stammer. If, on top of that, accessing services and support requires oral skills that work with AI responders, a person could feel far worse. I recently did not receive essential medication disbursed from a hospital pharmacy. I could not speak to a living person. I was effectively locked out, and the stress I was in made leaving a verbal message impossible.

What’s important to me is to feel independent. AI generated voices are forcing me to impose on friends and neighbours for support. Nothing is making me feel marginalized more than my telephone. The telephone system learned early to accommodate the deaf. It’s about time corporations and agencies learned how to accommodate the speech impaired.