El Pais paywall can be disabled via reader view in your web browser.
I dunno, everyone was cool with the love story of Wanda & The Vision from the MCU. I guess fucking robots is not ok, but becoming emotionally attached to one is?
I’ve never seen the Wanda and Vision show, but I always imagine it being Sonny from the I Robot movie with Will Smith, and Wanda Sykes.
I don’t think that’s a linear logic. We all know Vision is a robot. But we also know it’s a story about a robot that is played by a man. We are watching for the spectacle, not because we believed the story to be real.
Vision was also a robot with human-type consciousness and intelligence. We can, at least, nudge that into “funny-looking human” through suspension of disbelief.
Our level of robots is nowhere near that.
Exactly. The comic strip questionable content contains artificial intelligences with quirks, foibles, personalities, and a social understanding that they’re people too. In it people and ais have relationships and even marry. It’s no weirder than a human in a fantasy setting falling for an elf.
In the real world these are fancy chatbots owned run by corporations. Anyways here’s a video about people falling in love with them, it’s more sad than anything
Except Vision isn’t a robot, he’s an android. Or maybe more than that; a synthetic life form. He is his own person, with his own wants and needs. He can feel and develop opinions on things. He’s not merely a computer with a personality algorithm.
He’s not something that was gestated or birthed, thus is not a person. You can say an android is different, but regardless he’s not human or living. He’s a fancy thinking robot. Wanda basically fell in love with an LLM with an attached vibrator.
The love story in the movie “Her” is even more impressive. It’s impressive because it’s not even a robot, it’s just an AI voice and yet the love story is still compelling. And it also asks bigger questions, sure there’s the question of could a person fall in love with a machine, and it’s that ok. But it goes further to ask, if the machine is actually intelligent, what does the machine see in the humans? Do the machines actually still need the humans at all?
Sex with a hella sexy robot? Nice.
Using a hella sexy robot to fill the empitness of no intimacy or authentic mutual connection? Not nice.
For some reason sex with a robot doesn’t feel gross to me — until they start using it to fill a hole (hehe)
What about for people who struggle to have emotional intimacy and sexual intimacy throughout their lives because of medical issues or mental health issues?
My ex has a brother who is now pushing 40 and has never even held a woman’s hand. He has severe mental disabilities and will never live life on his own without some kind of caretaker. We know he looked at porn, partially because he refused to ever let people fix up his computer, usually out of fear of people seeing his porn.
Does he not deserve emotional and sexual intimacy? There is a high likelihood he will never have it otherwise.
until they start using it to fill a hole
What about, like in the situation I just described, when that hole will otherwise go a lifetime of being unfulfilled? Is that fair to them for being born a way they didn’t choose?
Different filler for different holes.
A sex bot is fine if you keep expectations in check. For the rest, friendship can go a long way. Help them find a hobby they can share with others (regardless of gender) and keep that platonic. That gives them social connection, and the sex bot gives physical release.
It’s not as good as a complete relationship, but at least there’s less risk of the sex bot creating more problems by trying to have it do human things.
That’s exactly the wrong take.
Provide something that isn’t what they need in order to fill a need they have.
That’s like giving someone drugs instead to masque symptoms of working in the problem and addressing it.
But that’s not right either. If providing sexual encounters was real and done appropriately then there this situation might still exists. If it’s the physical space and intimacy that are triggering, then a robot is a very good choice if it provides some of the missing human experiences that missing out on when desired make for more broken people
What they need is emotional intimacy, but they can’t get that because of crippling anxiety. You’re not going to get emotional intimacy from a robot, and if you try, you run the very real risk of really adverse effects, like this or this.
That’s why I suggested separating concerns. Keep the bot physical, and encourage real personal relationships in a low risk environment. There’s always a chance a personal relationship develops into something more, whereas there’s a lot of risk expecting a bot to fill that gap.
You’re telling me women don’t like vibrators.
Well i guess im a woman then lol
I’m no expert on attraction, but what if the sex robot looked like a skeleton?
I want to get off Mr. Bones Wild Ride.
I want to get off on Mr. Bones Wilde Ride.
I thought onlyfans was the cheap and easy desire “fast-food”-like product for women. Or instagram or whatever social media gives people the impression of being center stage. Not robots.
Humans are all different. It’s difficult to accurately generalize them. Some people like only fans, but for other people it does literally nothing for them.
To each their own.
Isn’t the answer quite obvious?
Aren’t most incels men?
There are plenty of women who don’t have intercourse regularly, but they are less likely than their male counterparts to whine about it.
They are less likely to be much concerned, even.
Men, on average, have a stronger sexual drive.
Citation needed
Hahahahaha no
Isn’t that because women have had vibrators for decades?
Thats easy to solve though. It’ll appeal to women if the sexbot can do household chores. Who wouldn’t want a robot maid?
In this current age of western dating Sex Bots at least cut out all of the bullshit for many men and give you basic companionship with the perks of sex, which is a lot easier for some than dating.
Make robots look like bears or dolphins?
All it took was one search to find plenty of contradictions to that post title.
I guess a vibrator isn’t a type of sex robot?
Just saying that these sort of toys were way more normalized for women long before they were for men.
A man with a fleshlight was a gross weirdo, a woman with a vibrator is a strong independent woman taking control of her sexuality and not settling for the weakness of flesh in men.
Colloquially, the word “robot” always implies a certain amount of anthropomorphism. So no, I don’t think a vibrator would count, as basically no vibrators on the market try to look human-like.
But that definitely is a weird difference between male and female sexuality - the sex toys women buy most are the very effective and utilitarian ones: Vibrator wands, Rabbits, Air pulse Vibrators etc.
While the most popular tools for men tend to focus on “realism”(?): Fleshlights, Sex Dolls, things like VR and POV porn. And I guess sex robots would fall into that category too in the future.
I can absolutely see the weirdness-factor of someone who is desperately trying to emulate a partner rather than just accept masturbation as a solo activity and optimize it from there 😬
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=robot+vacuum&t=fpas&iax=images&ia=images
Ah yes, the extremely humanlike robots. 😂
I think one difference is that men often have no support structures at all, and certainly not with levels of physical or emotional connection. They aren’t just craving sex, they are craving human intimacy and connection where it is very normalized in the west among women to have emotional and physical platonic intimacy among friend support groups.
A robot doesn’t need to be anthropomorphic, an assembly line robot is still a robot. It does however need to be able to perform some actions autonomously, for which a vibrator hardly qualifies.
An assembly line robot (like welding or material handling, I’ve worked with ABB, Fanuc, Motoman, Panasonic) are still called robot “arms” with the end portion often called the “wrist” so there is a degree of anthropomorphizing even if it’s not the whole body. And they do resemble an arm, however with 6 axis motion the motion is more like from your hips to your wrist than shoulder to wrist.
Iirc, traffic lights are called robots in some African English dialects. Although it’s more like one of those regional peculiarities.
Ok, then a vibrator is a robotic dick.
It does however need to be able to perform some actions autonomously, for which a vibrator hardly qualifies.
Fuck Machine has entered the chat
Overpriced pornstar-branded fleshlights aren’t the only masturbators in town and it’s not like there’s no life-like dildos either. The long and short of it is that the mechanics of a lubed hole are superior to that of a hand and you’re not looking at the entry point all the time so noone actually cares what they look like.
Yes, the branded stuff does exist, humans, male female, doesn’t matter, enter parasocial relationships news at 11. Can you imagine how well Justin Bieber dildos would sell.
Of course this is a thing lmfo.
I think you are confusing the word robot with the word android
Slap a pair of googly eyes on it and it as good as has a soul.
Dildos and vibrators were first a medical devices for hysteria.
Dildos have been around a lot longer than that. https://allthatsinteresting.com/history-of-the-dildo
My understanding is that “hysteria” legitimized the use of the vibrator (not unlike how “weight loss” was used in the 1980s to prescribe fentanyl), but they were around before that, and probably would have found another way of entering the mainstream.
Vibrators, too, if you count the hollowed out wooden dildos filled with angry bees.
hollowed out wooden dildos
I don’t think the Cage likes being referred to so blandly…
spoiler
This was my thought. Its the same way all our technology has grown. Honestly I think brain interfaces could eclipse robots like this before they are that great. As scary as that is.
I’d prefer a real hooker.
Former sex worker - what’s the appeal?
It’s basically impossible to do full service work without being severely traumatized. I guess I don’t have to pay for sex since I like men - no matter what age sex gender race what the fuck ever there’s a guy within 10 miles that’ll stick their dick in you - but I guess I don’t see the appeal of sex that my partner isn’t enjoying.
All sex is transactional, all women are whores and all men are johns, it’s just we have this weird cultural thing where it’s a crime to say “Look can I just Venmo you?” so we have to do things like pay for sex with flowers and chocolates and restaurant meals and jewelry and alimony.
“I faked all my orgasms” is up there with “your dick is small” on the list of “things women always say to men they’re angry at” so at some point his ability to care if its true or not burns out.
Are you sure it’s not just the women you’re having sex with are faking their orgasms?
Like, penetrative sex does not lead to orgasm for the majority of people with vaginas. You have to stimulate the clitoris. If you aren’t doing that - they probably are faking to get you to be done with it.
I’ve never met women concerned about dick size - being a “size queen” seems to be more of a thing for gay men. I don’t think there’s a lot of variation in feeling in a vagina for anywhere in the 4-7 inches range.
The attitude that all women are whores and that all sex is transactional seems sad to me. I had men say that to me when I was in the trade, and that was the kind of thing that contributed to it being hellish and unpleasant. I like the idea that sex is something people do because it’s fun and makes them feel good, not that it’s some sort of asymmetrical and hostile game.
I mean, sure. It’s easy to accuse me of being uniquely bad at sex, right? “Are you sure it’s not a YOU problem?”
Well according to the women I’ve slept with I’m simultaneously great and terrible in bed depending on if she was breaking up with me at the time the topic came to discussion. She’s either faking it in bed and the truth only comes out months later, or she’s having a good time in bed and trying to hurt my feelings while she’s angry at me. Which is why I brought up dick size. I don’t care if women care about dick size. I have a normal average medium-size dick and I’ve never been told that by a woman, it’s either huge or tiny depending on her desire to boost or bruise my ego. I’ve had the same woman say both.
I’ve asked every woman I’ve slept with some variation of Do you like that? What do you want to do? What’s your favorite? I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a useful answer out of that line of questioning. The most common response is an indignant “I don’t know!!!” like it’s an inappropriate question to ask at this moment. Or an “uh…yeah” or the surprisingly common continue to rhythmically moan as if no question was asked
Faking orgasms to get sex over with faster and then agreeing to have sex again with the same person is not the behavior of someone who wants to cum during sex. It’s such a dumbass way to go about achieving that goal that it’s just easier to believe the goal is something else.
She’s either got the notion in her head that there exists a man who “just knows” what she wants and she’ll never have to verbalize her wants or needs because he “just does” what she wants. Maybe she’s seen an old couple whose routines are in perfect sync and they fall apart without each other, and romcom movies have her convinced he just exists somewhere fully formed and all you’ve got to do is bend over to pick up dropped papers in front of the right business executive to get it, not spend 40 years of marriage living together, communicating, arguing, winning, losing, compromising, choosing battles and, pause for gasp, sometimes doing things for him too. So she just tries out a man, when he isn’t precisely what she has in mind she ghosts him and moves on to the next one.
Or, she’s willing to get on her back if if means a free meal at local fancy restaurant she can post to Instagram and maybe also even eat.
“what’s the appeal?”
Of a sex worker or a robot?
basically it boils down to skin-on-skin human contact versus a toy in this case. Did you never ask a client/partner/audience member? I assume reasons may vary. -I personally think the nature of the (business) relationship to be low-pressure and relatively straight-forward. -That is if we are to contrast it with the dating experience for the average man. Not everybody is relationship material, regardless.
I guess, it’s something that I have extremely complicated feelings about and severe trauma associated with. “Roses” on CL were kinda essential at a point in my life, and I’ve wondered what the other party got out of it.
Idk - like tons of men will “stealth” you. Or they’ll pressure you into not wearing condoms when they know you’re desperate.
Maybe this is trauma dumping I’d like to be retroactively humanized by a “john” a bit. But I’m just not sure how common it is not to be ultimately traumatized at the other end of things. This is not to be a “SWERF” - but what’s the difference between a human and one of these robots?
Edit: maybe a story more aligned to positive feelings towards “Johns” - the older man who saw that my tires were deflated and brought out a pump to fix it. He liked a thing I don’t but isn’t abnormal. Tolerable but not “enjoyable.”
The others are hard to balance it out against. Perhaps a consequence of not having a “Nordic model” or legalization. But also the kind of thing that often make it hard to think rationally. This is why I’m deeply empathic to Dworkin.
I didn’t want to make assumptions on your initial comment as i didn’t know if you were referring to yourself as a full-service sex worker or were using the term under the more general definition applied to strippers, adult film stars, and cam-models, etc. I’ve never hired a hooker, before but visiting Pahrump Nevada, or the red light district of the Netherlands is still on my bucket list.
-That said, having your own personal choice and control over the situation taken away either by guys trying to “stealth” you or to take advantage of a desperate situations at the potential expense of your health is an awful thing to do to someone else. I can only speculate as to what each of your clients wanted that they couldn’t get from a toy. If i’m asked to return to your earlier question of what’s the difference between a human sex worker and a robot, I guess I’d respond by asking what’s the difference between non-sex worker and a robot?
While the work may not be 1:1 to you I can say with regards to strippers there’s still a kind of nonemotional intimacy, and the workers get to express their personalities which made things fun. I don’t know if you got a chance to do any of that or not.
–Are you able to seek counseling for this? Regardless of what I’ve said, that’s some pretty heavy trauma you seem to be trying to make sense of. It could be beneficial to work through it with someone that has more formal training and a deeper knowledge for learning how to cope with these kind of things.
I guess, desire needs to be reciprocal for me.
I later found a lot of enjoyment in entering gay “cruising” culture as passing man. It’s that same impersonal, focused on just the pleasure and not the meaning - but without the power dynamic and pretense. I say, this is what I want, he agrees, and then a fun time is had by all.
I think the difference between say, sex as work and making food as work - I don’t really need to care or like the person who makes my food. There’s not an incentive for them to participate in something that can be physically painful or uncomfortable and then even pretend to be enjoying it through that pain. A lot of workplaces do force you to pretend in similar ways - don’t Chikfila employees have to say “my pleasure” or something - but pretending while dissociating in the act does fuck with your head in unique ways I think.
Working in Nevada or the Netherlands might be different. I guess when legalized, maybe you can say “slow down” or press a button for help when they take off the condom. I’ve only lived my life of course.
I do have some professional help, but don’t live in an area where the mental health needs of transexual former hookers are particularly accommodated for.
It’s funny to think that far enough into the future this may be viewed as robophobic.
