I beg to differ. I'm working on a game and using AI art for both photographic and artistic character portraits has enabled me to make a game I otherwise wouldn't be able to. I'm making everything else myself, except ChatGPT has also been a great help in learning C# and Unity. The ideas are my own, the photos I use for backgrounds are taken by me (I must've taken hundreds by now so I have plenty to choose from), the nearly 30 000 words so far of dialogue and narration were written by me, and all the music and sound effects will all be made by humans. The idea for the game is my own, and I'm the one brainstorming the scenes, characters, and conversations. I'm the one doing research and pouring my own experiences and reflections into the game to hopefully make it feel insightful, make people think and laugh, and cover some important topics. I could go on, but you get the idea.
SPIRIT is my first real big project and if it's ever completed and takes off, no one would be happier than me if I was able to do what the The Roottrees are Dead developer did and hire a human artist to make new portraits, but right now? No chance. No artists are missing out on work because I wouldn't be able to hire them anyway, and I doubt anyone would be willing to make a large number of character portraits for free.
You're free to be as opposed to this new technology as you want, but unfounded, generalizing rants about stupidity and desperation only makes you look dogmatic and uninformed. Also funny how using AI assets is lazy, but no one bats an eye at using free assets from for example Unity, even though this arguably takes considerably less effort and creativity than making assets from scratch with AI.