retirement: the rationale 

Having created a piece which relied so heavily on accuracy and thorough research, I spent most of my development process focusing on the research elements, which in turn, helped to manifest my plot. The main research topics I decided to focus on were humanoid robots, how these robots would be integrated into society, and fetishism. Each of these contributed substantially to the world and society built within my creative piece, and helped the development and accuracy of my writing.

In my reading, I came across a prediction that stated that by 2040, “robots will have computers powerful enough to simultaneously simulate the world and reason about the simulation.” This idea led me to wonder about the processing possibilities for future robots, based on their growth from those of the past. It has been observed that “human thought is biologically and technologically poised to explore cognitive spaces that would remain forever beyond the reach of non-cyborg animals”, which generates the suggestion that technological advancement is, in essence, essential to human advancement – an idea which had a heavy impact on the building of the technology-dependent society I created in my piece. 

An area of research that was not only interesting, but also extremely relevant to my piece, was the possibility of the social integration of intelligent AI into human civilisation. This is a topic that has been covered extensively throughout modern fiction in the last couple of decades, giving me several exciting directions in which to take my exploration and research. One particularly poignant example is Ex-Machina, which discusses the “implications, responsibilities, [and] consequences of getting emotionally involved with a machine.” The film presents the idea that, even though people are often aware that an AI is not ‘human’ they will project humanity onto it against their better judgment; which, as also depicted by the film, can lead to disastrous consequences. While the negative after-effects of such a relationship were, in this case, contained to a few casualties, this sequence of events led me to consider what impact human-robot relationships might have on the wider society within my piece. These ideas are further replicated in films such as Her, which depicts another intentional human-robot romance, and AI, which presents a similar idea, but with a parent-child relationship, in which the child is a robot. This topic was also discussed at length within Love and Sex with Robots. 

The idea of a modern AI-inclusive society being fraught with risks has been further explored in the television show Humans, wherein ultra-lifelike humanoid robots are employed to serve human beings, taking on roles such as assistants, nannies and prostitutes. Each of these concepts was very relevant to the research for my piece, as they each put forward a new layer of controversy regarding AI; specifically, the latter, which linked more directly with my creative piece, and so gave me an interesting perspective on how I was going to present sexualized AI. Humans approached this topic with a particularly interesting take, as making robots not only sexualised, but sex workers, combined two areas of taboo and brought them into wider consideration. As far as the creative development of my piece was concerned, the idea that “when sex workers display or feign sexual arousal or pleasure for their clients’ gratification, they are engaging in emotional labour” either does not apply to robots at all, or applies to them even more than human sex workers. If human sex workers have to put on a façade of sexual satisfaction for the purpose of their job, it could be argued within the context of my story that sex robots, which have no genuine emotion, must maintain this façade constantly. This became a question of ethics within the development of my piece, as I began to consider whether or not the robots believed they could feel genuine emotion – and whether that was enough to grant them ‘humanity’. This is an idea which has been widely explored in other mediums of fiction, such as the robots working within the service industry in Westworld, and the integration of robotic beings into human society, introduced in Blade Runner

Fetishism was one of the driving forces behind my creative piece, and allowed me to present several issues, which I felt would be especially important within the context of the Botverse world. One particular example came from Buffy the Vampire Slayer in which the character Spike commissions a robotic double of the protagonist, Buffy, when he cannot get her to return his affections. The link between this and fetishism was the aforementioned idea that fetishism surpasses inter-personal attraction, and focuses mainly on selfish desire of a goal or concept. Documentaries such as My Sex Robotperpetuate this idea – specifically in a section of the film in which a man attempts to hypnotize his girlfriend so that she will act like a robot during sexual acts. Although she does seem to consent, it is clear that the fixation is not on the woman herself, but on the robotic traits. This became a vital idea for my piece, as I explored society’s fascination with technology, paired with its growing openness about sexuality and the more illicit side of the sex industry, such as that exhibited in Pink Flamingos, Fifty Shades of Grey, and American Mary. An interesting twist on this narrative was presented in the film Girlhousein which an obsessive murderer in a ‘dollification’ style mask reigns terror amongst a group of young porn stars. This again inspired me to consider society’s current fixation on sex and how this would shape their relationship to robots designed specifically to fulfil their desires in this area.  

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