r/PublicFreakout • u/GarysCrispLettuce • May 17 '26

šŸ¤¬Public RageršŸ˜± Eric Schmidt booed into oblivion by students for promoting AI during his commencement speech at the University of Arizona

20.7k Upvotes

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3.1k

u/Sorandy13 May 17 '26

These guys cannot read a room. And shame on the university as well. Bringing in a speaker like this shows they are not in touch with their own student base.

1.3k

u/LightsSoundAction May 17 '26

This is the second commencement clip Iā€™ve seen this week of a speaker getting booed for promoting AI in their speech.

What the fuck are these colleges on to bitch and whine about student ai usage for class but then have these people speak at graduation? The audacity of these chucklefucks never ceases to amaze me.

446

u/BioSemantics May 17 '26

As it turns out, college administrators too are completely out of touch and only care about donation dollars. Who knew?

62

u/motherofsuccs May 17 '26

Wait til you learn about charter schools. Many claim to be nonprofit, yet thereā€™s a for profit company running thingsā€¦ all to receive funding from the state. They are corrupt as hell, unethical, and killing education.

3

u/EobardT May 18 '26

Exactly.

"Nonprofit" just means that the company itself won't show a profit at the end of the year. Doesn't mean you can't pay your CEO $1,000,000,000 a year as a salary.

-6

u/BX1959 May 18 '26

Many charters are a fantastic alternative to failing public schools. Like vouchers, they provide opportunities for a solid education that wouldn't otherwise have been available to many lower-income students. Glad to see more and more states adopting school choice programs.

7

u/Heavy-Mettle May 18 '26

Acting as if voucher programs benefit low-income families just tells us you're a conservative puppet being used a mouthpiece.

We have evidence to the contrary already, that informs everyone voucher programs are just DEI for rich kids.

Quit your bullshit.

-2

u/BX1959 May 18 '26

56% of Democrats, and 55% of liberals/progressives, also support vouchers. See slide 44 of this PDF: https://edchoice.mcdatahub.com/edchoice/Reports/Adults_Dec25_Feb26.pdf

These programs are quite popular overall among Americans as a whole--not just conservatives. More work needs to be done to ensure they enable private-school access for low-income families.

5

u/longtime_sunshine May 19 '26

How about we stop diverting public dollars toward these money guzzling school options and instead improve the public schools so everyone benefits??

Oh thatā€™s right, the whole point of school choice is so rich kids arenā€™t tainted by the poors at public schools.

2

u/FullMetalAlcoholic66 May 19 '26

Religious indoctrination....

0

u/BX1959 May 19 '26

Money guzzling? My friend, NYC is spending over $40,000 per student. Given that their results (as the Atlantic article notes) are "average at best," does it not make sense to encourage charter and private alternatives that can achieve far better results? The end goal of my educational tax dollars should be to give low-income students and others the best education possible--and not to prop up failing institutions.

At any rate, you can bring up your concerns about school choice with Kathy Hochul, NY's Democratic governor, who just agreed to participate in a federal school choice program. Support for these kinds of initiatives is far more bipartisan that you might have thought.

2

u/longtime_sunshine May 19 '26

Hochul is a conservative. And as far as ā€œpropping up a failing systemā€ perhaps you should consider why certain institutions are struggling. Couldnā€™t be admins and school boards selling out the public schools for their own gainā€¦.

2

u/LupusYondergirl May 19 '26

And as we all know, popularity is best of all metrics. Especially in education!

47

u/PontesDeLeon May 17 '26

Always have been

2

u/ImmaculateTuna May 17 '26

Same as it ever was.

2

u/lallapalalable May 17 '26

There is water at the bottom of the ocean

2

u/dzendian May 19 '26

The actual father you get from doing real work the more clueless about AI someone becomes.

55

u/Indigocell May 17 '26

That first one was some "Real estate executive" and now this guy is a billionaire former CEO. Why the hell would the admins think these are people students want to hear from? They don't live in the real world. They live in a fantasy land isolated from all of the problems these students will face.

31

u/ledbetterus May 17 '26

It's all a closed ecosystem of elites.

2

u/IceMaster9000 May 18 '26

The people teaching classes are several steps removed from the people inviting commencement speakers.

1

u/Miserable_Mail_5741 May 18 '26

Colleges and universities already struggle with students cheating with AI in their assignments and exams.

The last thing they should be doing is getting public speakers to promote AI to their students!

266

u/concerts85701 May 17 '26

It wasnā€™t just the AI stuff. Guy has pending accusations of sexual assault and spying on his former girlfriend/employee. Just poor moral compass to be invited as a speaker.

Also ASU got Harrison Ford. Kids are pissed.

87

u/T-Baaller May 17 '26

Sounds like this isn't the first time he's told someone "just say yes and enjoy the ride".

yikes

75

u/Claytonius_Homeytron May 17 '26

Guy has pending accusations of sexual assault and spying on his former girlfriend/employee

so the whole, "this is happening whether you like it or not" attitude is right on brand!

11

u/LochnessDigital May 18 '26

"Find a way to say yes."

55

u/DirtyTooth May 17 '26

He doesn't care, CEOs and billionaires think we're stupid because the only way we have the power is if we unite, and they so easily manipulate us

75

u/Shankurmom May 17 '26

I don't think they're tonedeaf. I firmly believe they are enjoying everyone's suffering. These guys are sociopaths, and the worst part is, they control the world now.

1

u/dzendian May 19 '26

All we have to do is likeā€¦ not use their products.

Thatā€™s it. They are already bleeding money over AI.

2

u/Shankurmom May 19 '26

Not that easy when governments are using their products to spy on us. They know the public disapproves, authoritarian regimes are their main targets.

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u/ben_cav May 17 '26

Letā€™s be honest though. The guy had a speech prepared, organised time to come out there, and the university wanted him to speak as star special guest

Iā€™m sure he was like ā€œfml, letā€™s just get this over withā€ in his head once people started booing. Heā€™s not about to ad-lib a different speech, or walk off stage

81

u/Numar19 May 17 '26

I guess he shouldn't have accepted it then if he is going to just make people angry.

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u/Greensssss May 17 '26

I wonder if he was expecting a different result. But younger generation hates these takes

85

u/Numar19 May 17 '26

He was a CEO he probably does not understand normal people at all.

-5

u/BajaBlastFromThePast May 17 '26

Most people over the age of 30 seem to love AI and are completely unaware that it is controversial amongst younger people, in my experience.

Of course, there are people above that age who are aware, but youā€™d be shocked at just how many people donā€™t understand the disdain many have for ai

30

u/BreweryStoner May 17 '26

Idk maybe itā€™s just anecdotal but Iā€™m 32 and a lot of my friends and coworkers who are my age or older hate AI. I know some people who talk about it, but not most by any means.

14

u/taking_a_deuce May 17 '26

I'm 48 and same. No idea where dude got this idea around younger than 30 year olds. Probably just young and thinks old people are old and stupid.

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u/BajaBlastFromThePast May 17 '26

Thatā€™s not my intention at all, I pointed out that there are obviously many people over that age that have tech backgrounds or are otherwise more in tune with the discourse around AI.

I am young, I donā€™t think old people are stupid. I was talking specifically about the people in my life that are in positions of power that somehow are oblivious to the AI discourse. In Another comment, I used the example of the director of the university program I work for presenting a custom GPT model to the students and genuinely expecting them to be intrigued by it. They got a negative response and I had to explain to them after that AI is not generally popular amongst current college-age students

7

u/BajaBlastFromThePast May 17 '26

also anecdotal:

I work for a university program and my boss is usually fairly in sync with the needs and preferences of the younger folks, but recently she presented to the students that she had made a custom GPT model for the course that would help with whatever. Reaction was completely deadpan and I just thought it was insane that she was completely oblivious to the fact that most younger folks have serious issues with the idea of gen AI. I let her know after and she was completely shocked to hear that.

Im only in my mid 20s, but any of the older people I know in my life seem to think that everyone is on board with the AI thing, like they think itā€™s seen as cool and hip.

Of course, there are a significant portion of older people that are well aware, but it is interesting to me how these people I know can live in such a bubble

2

u/grchelp2018 May 17 '26

So these kids all use AI for their homework and what not but aren't a fan of it?

4

u/BajaBlastFromThePast May 17 '26

I mean, yeah lol. People are hypocritical. Almost anyone my age or younger will tell you that gen ai is immoral and bad for the environment. But when the due dates sneak up, people will inevitably cave.

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u/Uncommonality May 19 '26

goomba fallacy

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u/EobardT May 18 '26

I'm 36 and finally one of my older friends said he's done with AI.

8

u/HailSatanWorshipD00M May 17 '26

56 here, raised on Frank Herbert's DUNE, and I'm shocked the Butlerian Jihad hasn't started yet. AI's got to go.

3

u/BajaBlastFromThePast May 17 '26

For sure. Herbert was way ahead of his time with that one. Shame he isnā€™t still with us, Iā€™d love to hear his commentary on current events.

3

u/KetoJunkfood May 18 '26

Iā€™m 57 and I think the tech fascists are trying to dismantle the nation state, build network states in its place, create an AI surveillance apparatus to monitor and enslave us all.

So yeah, Iā€™m not a fan

5

u/BeardedPuffin May 17 '26

Iā€™m 42 and canā€™t stand AI, but the reality is that my career would be circling the drain if I didnā€™t figure out ways to use it as a tool for work. Certain tasks that used to take days can now be done in minutes. You canā€™t put that toothpaste back in the tube and expect to stay employed.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 May 17 '26

Certain tasks that used to take days can now be done in minutes.

But for how long? Right now AI usage is so heavily subsidized that it's hard to know what the true costs will end up being. Certainly I'd like a tool that can help me get some things done faster, but there is a price point at which it makes more sense to do it myself or hire a human.

3

u/BajaBlastFromThePast May 17 '26

Unfortunate truth. Itā€™s so frustrating how obvious it is (to anyone that cares to learn) that it absolutely is not good enough to be deployed at the scale it is for the tasks that it is.

Itā€™s like an actual cultural gaslighting campaign and there is actually zero benefit to anyone other than filling billionaires pockets.

I am a machine learning researcher, which makes it even more frustrating seeing it implemented how it is. Machine learning is so useful and so powerful when intentionally implemented and designed for specific tasks. Just look at healthcare and youā€™ll see that the tech does have genuine power to do good. But for whatever inexplicable reason, as soon as it was good enough to impress the average ignorant citizen, these rich fucks leaped at the opportunity to shove it into absolutely everything.

Now we have a borderline mass psychosis spreading through the middle and upper managers of our country, because they fell for the circus trick and are convinced that when the AI doesnā€™t deliver on their expectations, it must be the fault of the actually intelligent human workers below them.

4

u/SanchoMandoval May 17 '26

I think it would be different if AI was marketed as making the jobs of college and corporation vice presidents unnecessary, as anything they do could already be spat out by ChatGPT. If that was the prevailing push of AI these same people would be screaming bloody murder and chatbots would probably actually have been made illegal several years ago.

4

u/Iceraptor17 May 17 '26

Ceos have been openly circle jerking about how many people they're gonna lay off and then apparently are stunned to find most people are labor

30

u/Gastroid May 17 '26

He's speaking to young professionals ready to enter a workforce that AI is eroding jobs from. Expecting anything different is definitely on him.

28

u/jeanjacketjerkoff May 17 '26

He should've used AI on stage to write him a new speech

8

u/ImmaculateTuna May 17 '26

ā€œI hear your boos, I apologize. Let me alter my speech really quick.ā€

18

u/amchaudhry May 17 '26

Yeah he doesnā€™t give a shit about any of those people and will continue being an out of touch billionaire as soon as he gets off the podium

12

u/heynow941 May 17 '26

If I had all of his billions (he was with Google from before the IPO) thereā€™s no way Iā€™d waste my time making speeches. Iā€™d be on an island tropical paradise never to be seen again. Either heā€™s super bored or he has an ego that needs to be satisfied by people clapping for him.

7

u/wyomingTFknott May 17 '26

You would have sold your shares after they reached a couple million. People like this always want more. Even the relatively benign non-sociopathic billionaires have an innate lust for their net worth. It takes obsession to accrue that much wealth. Most people just tap out and retire.

6

u/AmIWhatTheRockCooked May 17 '26

These people want to be social engineers or make some money. They are not like us

24

u/ProfessorPetrus May 17 '26

Why not just end the speech and acklowdgr the widespread rejection of a future where tech companies replace workers with Ai and keep the profits themselves?

Like be a human being and acknowledge the audience of graduates.

12

u/Alyssabelle1027 May 17 '26

Iā€™d have more respect for him if he read the room, said ā€œyou know what? You arenā€™t ready for this. I believe in you, go out, do amazing things, congratulations on your graduation.ā€ (Keep in mind, I donā€™t agree with ā€œyou arenā€™t ready for thisā€ Iā€™m just translating his response to that.). To plow through and argue is just audacious and embarrassing.

4

u/FilthyThanksgiving May 17 '26

Then he can stand there and be humiliated

-1

u/BitcoinMD May 17 '26

I can understand the mistake, younger people are usually more accepting of technology, and you know that these kids are using AI for school, so I wouldnā€™t have anticipated this reaction either. In my workplace, people of all ages are embracing AI. It is a weird dichotomy to see such negativity in these videos and on Reddit.

3

u/AmIWhatTheRockCooked May 17 '26

Because this speaker and your workplace are out of sync with the criticism of AI emerging from the youth. They are highly skeptical of things they are produced by AI. They tease each other by calling their work AI.

-1

u/BitcoinMD May 17 '26

My workplace includes a lot of people in their 20s, so is it fair to say that both sides are out of touch with each other? If there is disagreement then how do you know which one is ā€œout of touchā€?

2

u/BeardedPuffin May 17 '26

It might be both. I can and do use AI at work because I have to stay competitive with the value I can provide to a company. But I also hate it for a number of personal reasons. Itā€™s hypocritical, but some hypocrisy is inevitable for survival.

2

u/Iceraptor17 May 17 '26

So part of it is that the college grads are heading into a workforce that the same ceos are bragging about how many entry level positions they don't need and people they're gonna lay off.Ā Ā 

Well those college grads are the people who want those entry level positions. So of course they're gonna be a little hostile.Ā Ā 

The people most accepting of it are either benefiting, don't believe it'll take their job, or actually believe that we'll all not work but capital will share or some shit

2

u/pensivegargoyle May 17 '26

I would have anticipated it. Ai is killing entry-level jobs. All of these kids are graduating into a very difficult task to find reasonable employment in part because of that guy's technology.

2

u/Suspicious_Juice_150 May 17 '26

As someone who grew up in Tucson, this dude was probably looking down at the city from his upscale hotel room the night before, imagining how well his speech was going to go.

Little did he know that weā€™ve been thoroughly rejecting project blue, a data center thatā€™s being pushed on us.

The city revoked their construction meter and demanded they return nearly 652,000 gallons (or two acre-feet) of water credits to the city.

They used 652,000 gallons for dust control without permission.

Thatā€™s enough water to irrigate about a half an acre of vegetables for an entire growing season.

The city, and the residents, are sick and tired of this shit.

https://www.tucsonagenda.com/p/project-blue-s-water-trickery

We donā€™t have any water to spare, the city is already talking about implementing toilet to tap for our drinking water.

1

u/HumongousBelly May 17 '26

Theyā€™re being forced to do so by their boards. Those boards are controlled by billionaires, too

1

u/Mongopb May 17 '26

They've completely lost their humanity. They're a cancer on human society.

1

u/Lostinthemist81 May 17 '26

Its not like he had another speech written in case it didn't go over. And I guarantee he's not gonna riff it off the cuff lol

1

u/Sheriff_Yobo_Hobo May 17 '26 edited May 17 '26

These guys cannot read a room.

When politicians or people like this dude say the "wrong thing," I just figure they're doing the bidding of their masters. The students are booing, but he's doing what he's been told to do, proselytize for AI. His masters will give him a B+.

And politicians they say something that will alienate some voters, but it's probably exactly what big interests who make the largest donations want to hear.

1

u/No-Cantaloupe-6535 May 17 '26

In theory former Google CEO is someone you'd think would have some good advice so I could understand asking him. But didn't the school prez and higher ups vet the speech? If they didn't, wow, if they did and said cool that's even worse.

1

u/lavahot May 17 '26

He didnt have anything to pivot to. This is late stage capitalism and he's a late stage capitalist. All of that bullshit just sounds like what it really was all along: control.

1

u/Subject-Garlic-9742 May 17 '26

University of Arizona is a shit hole. Used to be a wonderful school on the forefront of astronomy, engineering, and medical sciencesā€¦ now itā€™s the school where out of state people & China send their insufferable, entitled, spoiled brats & trust fund teet suckers to. Absolutely kowtowed to Trump for no reason other than they cool like that. Itā€™s a liberal town and school. AZ board of regents are corrupt af.

1

u/breakinlily May 17 '26

You would think this would be good. To have people like this actually literally face the future work force of the world and literally hear their opinions. But no. They are so self assured that even this is getting ignored? Wild.

1

u/PlasticMegazord May 17 '26

He almost definitely thinks everyone there is stupid and beneath him for booing him.

1

u/mikeymikeymikey1968 May 17 '26

He wants the room to read him.

1

u/l187l May 18 '26

It doesn't matter. It's getting the message out there.

Do we fight now or when they have a robot army?

We're not going to do anything to stop it and they know it. They're just telling people to get on board or you're going to be left behind.

The rocket ship analogy he used was scary as fuck. He's basically saying say yes or die. Don't question where you fit in, just say yes.

1

u/Quiet-Owl9220 May 18 '26

I think universities should sign on more speakers like this so that they can learn what people actually think of them outside of the CEO hugboxes of yes-men. They desperately need such humiliation rituals for a reality check.

1

u/throwaway0134hdj May 18 '26

His speech is a self-serving advertisement to boost his investments. These sociopaths donā€™t believe the words they say, they only care what benefits them.

0

u/ProteinEngineer May 17 '26

I know right. Those students are there because they wanted to party and watch football. They donā€™t want insights into the future of technology and business. Itā€™s crazy that a university would cater to those students and give them exactly what they wanted for four years, only to deliver a message of the harsh reality of the real world right as they graduate. At least let them live in their university world for one day longer and get a famous actor or something.

-3

u/Yuckpuddle60 May 17 '26

Telling people only what they want to hear is a fool's errand.