Wow. It's not classist to believe in paying people for their work, and this is coming from me, someone who usually ends the month with a negative bank account.

There are no excuses for using AI. Will they still be okay with it when someone uses it to steal their work?

I'm not an artist, and I can't pay, so I either wait until I can, or I do a fair value trade of something I know how to do that benefits the other party.

I once asked an artist I knew how much she charges to design book covers. She asked if it was for me and I said yes, and so she said she knew I could not afford it but that she really, really loved the hand made prayer beads I make and that she would design the cover in exchange for me making her a set of beads.

The value of the beads wasn't as much as the value of her work, but it worked because she proposed it and we were both happy.