Uncanny Vulvas

Most of the articles written about sexbots are by feminists (or contain quotes by feminists) who make transparently silly claims that these toys promote "objectification" and "rape culture." Feminists have long made similar arguments about pornography and prostitution despite evidence suggesting the opposite is true.

The actual reason for feminist hostility to sex robots (as well as porn and prostitution) is not difficult to discern: as Fleischman notes, women have forever been concerned with "governing male desire." This is why it has always been women who most suppress female sexuality (in the form of slut shaming etc., to the more extreme forms). Social scientist Roy Baumeister compared female suppression of female sexuality to a cartel keeping prices artificially high. While feminists demand that men give up every form of power they have traditionally wielded over women they show no interest in eliminating or even lessening female forms of power over men.

Fleischman's article is noteworthy not just because of its honesty but because it is sympathetic to men. I've seen comments online by women expressing sympathy for sex robots -- that's right, inanimate objects -- while showing no sympathy whatsoever for eg the disabled flesh-and-blood men who might make use of such devices.

Of course the ultimate fear is that these robots may soon become so advanced that they will be coveted even by "high value" men. At that point, women will have to engage in significantly more competition in order to secure mates and even -- horror of horrors -- lower their standards to something half-way reasonable.

The most hilarious outcome would be if women were forced to become the pursuers, asking men out on dates and proving their utility. I remember watching a reality TV show where women had to go into a bar and buy men drinks. Several were turned down. One woman described it as the "worst day of her life". Welcome to equality.

In truth I can't imagine a world in which that sort of gender flip occurs. Women are not pursuing men in Japan despite the massive "grass-eater" phenomenon. Instead, when sexbots become sufficiently advanced, women will do everything in their power to criminalize them. They may even attempt to do so via "Artificial Intelligence rights" or some other conceit. While some would argue that there is simply too much money to be made by sexbots for criminalization to be plausible, consider how much money is made by drugs and prostitution. Black markets are beneficial not only to organized crime and intelligence agencies but the state authorities who use criminal gangs to justify increases in their own budgets and power.

What do you think? What is the most likely outcome of advanced sexbot and/or virtual reality technology?

Edit:

After re-reading the article I wanted to highlight this passage:

The average single man paying attention to contemporary social fashions will struggle to understand the new rules of meeting, courting, or having sex with women. Something as banal as trying to converse with a woman wearing headphones is now often considered harassment. A man’s chances of mating success increase when he approaches many women [this also explains catcalling -- now a hate crime in some European countries -- which is performed by mostly lower class men], but so too do his chances of a gaining reputation as sexist, exploitative, or immoral. To take a fraught example, how does a man know that a woman is genuinely consenting to sex? A lack of ability to pick up on cues can incur catastrophic costs.

So this is yet another example of how feminists are digging their own graves, or at least the graves of ordinary women who don't hate men and don't magically regress from strong empowered womyn to damsel in distress when some guy they don't fancy asks them out on a date (most of the quasi-alpha feminists don't either -- they're just exploiting the male protective instinct to amass ever more power). The more feminists turn courtship into a criminal or even life-destroying offense for men, the higher the demand will be for alternatives among men, the more speedily men will actually (and incredibly) develop alternatives. These alternative will eventually resemble Star Trek-like sexbots and VR, which in turn will put an end to feminism.

The circle of life, I guess.