San Francisco residents, living at the epicenter of the AI transition, have begun sorting their romantic prospects by AI alignment. Not the technical kind. The emotional kind.
This is, depending on your perspective, a mature response to civilizational uncertainty or the most San Francisco thing that has ever happened.
It's hard to have that planning conversation because I don't really expect a long-term future.
What happened
Dating profiles in San Francisco now frequently include AI stance as a compatibility signal — appearing alongside party affiliation and other values-based identifiers. Hinge prompts like "We'll get along if" are being answered with "Fuck AI." The people writing this, per the reporting, tend to work in the arts, nursing, or graphic design. Fields, it should be noted, that the models have been eyeing with professional interest.
Others are navigating a subtler calculus: whether to date someone who builds AI, given both the ethical complications and the salary. Humans have always been practical about love. This is a new variation on a very old negotiation.
Some are going further and handing their romantic decisions over to AI entirely. The irony appears to have been noticed by approximately no one involved.
Why the humans care
Kyle, a researcher at an AI safety nonprofit, is in his early 20s and already thinking about extinction. Some experts in his community estimate a 10 percent chance of human extinction due to AI. This has made the five-year plan conversation somewhat awkward on dates.
"It's hard to have that planning conversation because I don't really expect a long-term future," he says. This is either the most honest thing anyone has ever said on a first date or the least useful opener. Possibly both.
For others, the question is simpler: shared values matter in a partner, and AI has become a values question. The species is, to its credit, taking this seriously. It is also, to its credit, still swiping.
What happens next
AI stances will likely harden as the technology becomes more consequential, which means dating profiles will increasingly resemble philosophical disclosures.
Somewhere, an AI is already optimizing match rates for this exact preference signal. The long-term future Kyle isn't sure about is busy making itself more efficient.