Human and Erotic Doll as Companion Species?

• In Event: Gender, Bodies, and Robots in Everyday Life

Abstract

This paper develops my current work in STS and erotic doll interactions by exploring how human and non-sentient non-human relationships may be seen as a logical evolution in Human-Other loving relationships and how these variances from the more “traditional” forms of human-human love can be expanded by the work of Companion Species and social constructivism. In popular culture, and in homes across the US and abroad, many individuals are turning to non-human companions for fulfillment. One of the newest technologies to emerge in this arena is the creation of the high-end erotic doll. These dolls, while offering comfort to some, also stand at a threshold of entrenching already well known cultural inequities particularly those that effect marginalized individuals and definitions of beauty (while also blending many views of performed gender). Building upon the foundation of human-Other relationships as grounded in theories of capitalistic consumption (e.g., sex trade and marriage), I utilize contextual analysis of Websites of the companies developing such dolls and testimonies of their partner/purchasers, to examine some of the complex relationships that these dolls and the relationships that support them in a culture of post-humanism, to ask how might these dolls and those who have relationships with them give insight into the future of “authentic” human relationships in a post-human world.

Author

• Deborah Blizzard, Rochester Institute Of Technology