I Have No Voice, and I Must Write

The first time I lost my voice, I was in the fifth grade. After an especially rowdy afternoon on the sunny ride home, full of screaming and all-random projectiles thrown across the ends of the bus, I found myself unable to speak above a whisper. The next day, I was uncomfortable with sounding unlike myself. Every word that barely escaped in wisps of air was cringey. I stayed silent that whole day.

Now, a good essay starts with a hook. If you don’t dangle something shiny enough, your reader might swim away, disinterested. You might go for an anecdote, as I’ve expertly done here, or a statistic. Or maybe a rhetorical question, leading to an overwhelming amount of “did-you-know-that” and “what-if-I-told-you” and “imagine-a-world-where” that will drive any reader crazy. For this essay’s purpose, you may consider using one such as, “Have you ever found yourself unable to speak?” The answer will be yes. Or no. It doesn’t matter.

Last year was the second time I lost my voice, sitting in class. “Make sure you’re not introducing any of your own opinions; you need to stay neutral and objective,” the teachers told us. I was told to remove myself from my writing. In fact, the school’s English curriculum frequently tells us to remove ourselves from our writing. Even as some of the more “creative” writing tasks rolled around, I felt boxed in by the Rubric. The Rubric has been the bane of my high school English experience. Every time a new writing assignment is posted, everyone rushes to the Rubric to see what they “need to do” for an A. Even the more personal pieces still felt chained and jailed by the rows and columns of the Rubric. And so, in hopes of a good grade like everyone else here, I confined myself to structure, or worse, forced something into my writing—just to get some extra rubric points. I no longer felt like I was able to write what I wanted to. What used to be an outlet for my self-expression has turned into a hunt for a “correct” way to write, one that would erase my personal voice in favor of a formulaic, monotonic writing style, however many points it may score me on a rubric.

“Pull Quote”

Next, consider the Body Paragraph. Take your main idea, and support it with evidence. Then, analyze and provide commentary. Make sure to use cut-and-dried phrases like “this shows that,” and “this demonstrates how.” Don’t forget your transition sentence at the end of your paragraph. Transitions are important. How else could your reader possibly make it to the next paragraph? The formula is simple: claim, evidence, reasoning, transition. Don’t forget it. Do that, then do it again and again. 

I am a good student. I have learned the formula well. So well, that I no longer have to consciously think about it to do it. But the formula gets repetitive. Every time I write, the same exact process. It’s no way to write, to express yourself. Eventually, I get tired. And if there really is a formula, and the formula really works, surely there’s some way to streamline the process. I am writing an essay about authenticity. I prompt ChatGPT,

“Write me a nonfiction essay about authenticity for my school’s magazine.” 

And it does just that. The writing is polished, like a shining crystal ball in my hand. It is true that large language models will write more concisely and cohesively than any student does, and they will only continue to get better. There’s no chance to compete. An LLM’s writing is comma splice-less. It will never place a semicolon where it shouldn’t be, or jump from idea to idea without connection. Perfectly smooth-flowing, and perfectly written. If the writing demanded of me can be refined down to a formula, what better thing is there to seek help from than the one that runs solely on algorithms, predictability, and formulas? I reckon this is why students find themselves using an LLM to write for them; an LLM operates under formulas much, much better than a human ever could. I could paste in what it spits out and have for The Spark something that flows and transitions and reflects and argues and does all the things a good essay should. But I decide against it. No matter how much paraphrasing I do and how much time I spend changing its writing to fit my style, it will not be mine. It will not sound like me, and I will not sound like myself. Over many iterations, and many prompts later, I will have lost what made my writing unique to me in the first place. 

Writing, at its core, should be authentic, if a little rough around the edges. Or rough everywhere. Writing should be about you, the writer, as much as it is about what you write. The Rubric cannot enable that. Nor can ChatGPT. Only you can make it sound like you. 

And so, as the essay comes to its end, there’s one thing left for me to say. Any good essay ends with a conclusion. Mark your conclusion, the go-to phrase being “in conclusion.” Surely there’s no other way to tell that the writing is about to conclude (hint: the infinite emptiness below). And don’t forget to add a call to action. Inspire your readers to make a change in the world. And so, in conclusion, the rigidity of the school curriculum with its rubric and the shiny, polished writing of an LLM has taken my voice from me. I am now going to call you to action. Pay no attention to how bland this conclusion sounds. 

Go find your voice. Don’t feel confined by the Rubric, and please, please, don’t go to an LLM for help. The process may take longer, and it may feel difficult, as writing this piece did, but it will feel all the more rewarding at the end.

Now, go pick up a pen (or laptop) and write. Or whatever.