Bulletin, 2010
Every weekend, some women on the Gonzaga campus choose to dress like sex robots. By cramming themselves into skin-tight polyester and miniskirts, these women package their own bodies as a product.
Recently, TrueCompanion, Inc. shocked some by introducing Roxxxy, the first sex robot capable of speaking, retaining information, engaging in conversation and being used for sex. For about $7,000 any person over the age of 18 can purchase and customize their very own sex robot, complete with specialized personality settings, haircut and color, make-up, and nail polish, as well as other certain anatomical specifications.
Similarly, it seems some young women in relationships do not balk at the idea of getting a Brazilian wax to match the women their boyfriends see in porn and the myriad of underwear-less celeb pictures gracing the tabloids, without asking for anything in return. Many of the actions young women have come to see as pedestrian and necessary are products of sex as a commodity.
Critics and fans alike have been vocal in their response to the product since its introduction at the Adult Entertainment Expo in Las Vegas in early January. Roxxxy has been a topic in a number of on-campus classes including Sex, Gender and Society and Gender, Family and Society, spurring dialogue. In almost every conversation on campus, the response seems to be vehement condemnation, but the conversation is a bit more complex than simple refutation. Upon examination, many of the arguments prove to be more complicated than they appear.
First, many opponents claim that using a sex robot is “just wrong.” Presumably, they are making the claim that it is immoral to use a robot for sexual contact. This argument raises other important questions about artifice in the world of sex; namely, is it immoral to use anything that is not human for sex? Where do we draw the line on products like the Fleshlight? Do those who oppose the sex robot also oppose products like sex toys, synthetic lubrication or Viagra? In a world where technological advance often outpaces societal readiness, it is naïve to not acknowledge a growing gray area when it comes to our relationship with technology.
There is another argument that we can’t ignore; sex robots bridge the gap between fantasy and reality. In a relationship with an actual person, the world of fantasy and the realm of reality have a barrier. However, with a device like Roxxxy, fantasy becomes an immediate reality in which any whim or predilection can be realized. In a world of increasingly accessible and prevalent porn, this becomes problematic.
Some opponents of sex robots (and of porn) make the claim that it hurts women. However, I see the unfortunate effects on both the men who are using sex robots and women at large. When there is no distillation of fantasy, no hesitancy to live out a whim, those who use products like Roxxxy alienate themselves from the organic, natural intimacy that can come from sex between humans. In this way, products like Roxxxy are the embodiment of ultimate human alienation. Roxxxy’s highly customized nature promotes an idea that women should be equally customizable, with each facet of their personality and body attuned to their partner’s wishes.
Another problem I see in the discussion is the level of delusion in the binary, us-versus-them world of people who would use a sex robot and people who would not. People are quick to put themselves in a category of those who would never use a product like Roxxxy (or Rocky, the soon-to-be-released male counterpart). However, every day we partake in activities I see as merely sex robotics re-packaged.
Women aren’t alone in this, though, as some men make it a part of their coming-of-age tradition to skulk into a darkened strip club to watch women gyrate in g-strings to “Pour Some Sugar On Me.” Some of these men would recoil in horror at the thought of using a sex robot. However, watching strippers and using Roxxxy are much the same. With Roxxxy, men pay for programmed, controllable sex. With strippers, men use dollar bills to dictate what women wear, how they dance, how they talk and what they do. To many, Roxxxy represents a completely new and decidedly bad advance in machinery. If we acknowledge the cultural meaning of our own actions, we see Roxxxy as merely the next baby step in a world of entangled sex and technology.
Products like Roxxxy will continue to push the boundaries of sexual technology. More importantly, however, they will force us to examine the activities we see as pedestrian that may be equally as hurtful to others and ourselves. Are we merely Roxxxys or Rockys ourselves? Do we treat others like sex robots that breathe? While a simple acceptance or refutation of these products is perhaps the most common response, I argue that an honest examination of our actions proves that we are perhaps already following a cultural, social and moral trajectory merely accelerated by products like sex robots.
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