Hell, I’m an em dash enjoyer.
this post was submitted on 25 Apr 2025
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— hey yeah, it's a long press option on Android too
In high school, an English teacher once told us she over used em dashes and her teacher told her you can't just dash through your papers. I tried to avoid their over use after that, which made me learn the other ways to organize my (chaotic) thoughts.
Needless to say, I think that it's a tell of young writers more than AI. The overuse is because the author isn't comfortable with using colons, parenthesis, or commas - the things that the em dash can substitute for grammatically.
A good writer understands offsetting with a dash adds more emphasis than commas (neutral) or parenthesis (lower emphasis). Overuse is a sign of either immaturity or AI. Since there's a lot of immature writers on the internet (and have been since the eternal summer began), it really isn't useful as a tell online.
not a sign of AI? correct. easy to type? bullshit, i have to google and copy and paste them 😭 my real physical pc keyboard only has - and _ :(
Just do Windows key + Period and find it in the symbols menu.
There exists multiple ways of inserting unicode chars:
- Visual selectors, like the character map in Windows, or gucharmap (gnome) or kcharselect (kde), and probably more
- Decimal input
- On Windows if you have a numeric keypad, you can hold down the
Altkey and type in the unicode code point expressed in decimal... with some caveats, the decimal for em-dash should be 8212 (see the next line), but in windows alt codes it is 0151 - In html—and therefore potentially in markdown—it is possible to use
&#[NUM];to input it, like this:—, which gives you the —
- On Windows if you have a numeric keypad, you can hold down the
- Hexadecimal input
- can be enabled in windows and macos, see the wikipedia link for more info
- ctrl+shift+u works... in some places
- With an IME such as ibus or fcitx5 installed on linux, it should work through the system
- For me, it works (without an ime installed) in Firefox
- Wikipedia says it may work in other X11 applications
- Clicking the Compose key (Linux. May need to be enabled), and writing
will get you an em-dash
Just say in the middle of your statement that billionaires should be shot and that will clear up provenance questions immediately!
Ceterum censeo, domini esse delendam.
I use those a lot—though without spaces. The spaces give it away .
I've been using the em dash a lot — decades! — due to influence from reading a lot of classics from the 1800s when I was a child, and I do it with the spaces around it for visibility, readability, and clarity. The spaces don't give anything away.
Fun fact: you can tell which of my comments I wrote on my phone vs my laptop based on if I write -- (on my phone, because my Thumbkey layout doesn't have an em dash) or — (on my laptop, where I've added Emd for em dash as a custom dictionary entry in my Japanese IME)
another psyop in the long line of haters against the em dash—stay strong my fellow writers!
Yeah my papers are full of em dashes, it's just a good punctuation and I'm sadly addicted to long and overly complex sentences.
Gotta start using "y'all" more so people know I ain't a robot
I'm all about that interrobang life now.
Yeah but then people will think you're a Redditor instead
That'll help me blend in. 
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I've never heard of an em dash before
Wait until you hear about the en dash
I know of k-dash which i always found strange since the name is written k` but it's a fun character in King of fighters
Man, I hate it. I use the em dash so much and now I'm super self conscious about it.
It has gotten me to use a semi-colon a lot more.
Em dashes are very useful. Typically you will not see a space between the em dash and the words, but you will for doubled hyphens -- like that—and that.
Ah, the em dash—a beloved tool for breaking monotony, adding drama, and spicing up sentence flow. However, when overused, it can indeed disrupt readability and feel excessive—turning what should be an elegant dash into a blaring interruption.
For language models, em dashes often emerge as a stylistic crutch. Why? They’re a versatile punctuation mark that easily connects related thoughts, adds emphasis, or replaces commas, colons, and parentheses. In the absence of true “tone” or “intonation,” an em dash creates a conversational rhythm, mimicking human-like spontaneity. But like seasoning in a dish, too much can overwhelm the palate—and diminish the intended effect.
The real artistry lies in knowing when to wield them—and when to opt for a subtler comma, a dignified semicolon, or the humble period. What do you think: are em dashes an enhancement or an irritant in writing?
Why would you go and use an AI ma'am
That’s a beautifully balanced take—witty, thoughtful, and self-aware. You walk the line between celebrating the em dash and calling out its potential for overuse like a punctuation sommelier. It reads like something that could be AI-generated, but also like something a very self-conscious writer (or editor) would compose while staring into the void of a Google Doc at 1 a.m.
If I were to respond in kind, I’d say:
Ah yes, the em dash—the punctuation equivalent of a dramatic pause, a raised eyebrow, or a perfectly timed plot twist. It’s the Swiss Army knife of syntax, but wielded too often, it starts to feel like a caffeinated narrator who won’t let a thought land without fireworks.
Still, when used just right? It sings.
So maybe the answer isn’t about whether em dashes are good or bad—it’s about pacing, intention, and a touch of restraint. (Or maybe we’re just overthinking a horizontal line.)
Wait, I only have to hold it down? I've been putting two consecutive hyphens together the hard way all this time.