So the Boobz are getting worked up – again – over some imaginary “proposed legislation” to ban sexbots. Vox Day, one of the esteemed elder statesmen of the right-wing of the manosphere, has resurrected an urban legend that first fooled his comrades about two years ago, reposting a “statement” of mysterious Canadian origin explaining that
provisions have been proposed for the new Human-Robot Personal Relationship Act, the first draft of which is currently being finalized.The provisions are specifically meant to target the concerns that were expressed at the roundtable that sexbots will negatively impact the pursuit for gender equality and may unduly emphasize the objectification of women as sexual objects.The suggested provisions fall into the larger framework of regulating the emerging service robot industry that will be governed by the Human-Robot Personal Relationship Act and under the direction of the Ministry of Robots and Artificial Intelligence, to be established in Ontario and other Canadian provinces and territories at the end of next year.
The main provision of this dastardly Femi-Canadian proposed legislation?
The use of sexbots in the privacy of one’s home is prohibited, unless otherwise permitted by the Ministry of Robots and Artificial intelligence or a relevant regulating agency as per the criteria outlined in the Human-Robot Personal Relationship Act.
You may wonder: Why didn’t I read anything in the papers about this Human-Robot Personal Relationship Act? Why haven’t I heard about this Ministry of Robots and Artificial Intelligence?
Well, you guessed it. Because neither of them exist. I looked into this two years ago when the story first, er, broke in the manosphere. There’s no vast feminist conspiracy to deny Canadian men (or, for that matter, women) their still-imaginary sexbots. The “statement” was evidently written as part of a law school class project on law and robotics taught by Prof. Ian Kerr at the University of Ottawa Law School.
If you Google “Human-Robot Personal Relationship Act” or “Ministry of Robots and Artificial Intelligence” you will find that literally the only people talking about this issue are MRAs and PUAs and conspiracy theorists. And some of the more gullible 4channers, though a few of them quickly figured out that the whole thing was fake. (As did the Real Doll enthusiasts.)
Vox Day, who has yet to come to this realization, draws some dire conclusions from this thing that isn’t real, declaring that the
This Canadian attempt to preemptively ban sexbots is an overt confession by feminists of both sexes concerning their belief that women have nothing significant to offer men but sexual services. Moreover, it is proof that their “pursuit for gender equality” is directly and fundamentally opposed to the most basic human freedom. …
One would think that even those only superficially acquainted with human history would realize that attempts to put the technological genie back in the bottle almost always fail, as do attempts to prevent men and women from pursuing pleasure in ways deemed illicit. But then, a near-complete ignorance of human history is required to either be a feminist or possess a genuine belief in the rainbow-tailed unicorn of equality.
Well, not so much. Though Vox proves yet again that there are few people on planet earth as gullible as the manosphere’s pompous philosophers.
NOTE: Vox isn’t the only manospherian up in arms about the evil imaginary sexbot ban; more on this tomorrow.
@LBT, I’m sorry, I know nothing about your background. Is there anything you can tell me about it (or not, if you’d rather I not ask)?
And I’m sorry things are going so rough for you, LBT :/
LOL. Vox “updated” his blog after reading Manboobz. Had to safe face;
UPDATE: Those who are pointing out that “the Human-Robot Personal Relationship Act” isn’t presently a prospective law before the Canadian parliament are completely missing the point. It is obvious it isn’t “real”; the Canadian government no more has a Ministry of Robots and Artificial Intelligence than the Obama administration is really building a Death Star with his campaign logo in the bowl. It does, however, have a “Minister of State (Status of Women)”; thus showing it’s not quite as far off-base as one might wish.
For my part in the IQ discussion, I really should’ve said “some sort of computer competency exam” (because fuck is saying “yes I checked the cables, twice, yes I restarted, yes I’ve tried XYZ other logical options, they don’t work, here why I’ve called the help desk” massively annoying)
LBT — dear gods does the “we won’t consult people with X disorder, because we’re experts and they’re ill” thing royally piss me off. I don’t get denied personhood, but I do get treated like I must not know anything relevant when fuck, I nearly finished a psych degree. As for your treatment, that’s both appalling and questionably ethical — things aren’t supposed to even qualify as disorders if they aren’t causing distress, intervering with functioning, or causing legal trouble (eg pedophilia). Iirc you’re more functional as a result of being multi, Mac’s Mr. Get Shit Done right? (Either way, that’s bullshit)
Unfortunately Basic Human Decency 101 is to part of a psych degree, really should be.
There was a movie about a male sexbot and a human female protagonist called “Circuitry Man,” made in 1990. Strangely, he was programmed to be in love with a woman who didn’t really exist. But he became sentient and realized he loved a human woman who was not a part of his programing. A man wrote the movie, someone named Steven Lovy.
PennyDreadful — click LBT’s username, the link goes to his comics (comics I love btw)
Ok, LBT, I found your links and am doing my research : )
““we won’t consult people with X disorder, because we’re experts and they’re ill”’
Well yeah, the first way to disempower someone who doesn’t fit into your box is to label them with a disorder and then tell them you know better than they do. Hell, the DSM didn’t remove homosexuality until recently.
RE: katz
It’s okay. I STILL get the sense that even off my meds, I’m happier than Abnoy!
RE: Argenti
It’s MADDENING! I mean, there’s a goddamn dissociation conference every year, and I wish to hell I could go, set up a little motherfucking booth with my stuff, and put up a sign: “talk to an actual multiple.” Except they wouldn’t let me in because it’s not actually for dissociatives, it’s for pros who DEAL with dissociation. So much theory, and nothing about just going and spending time with the people who actually EXPERIENCE it. Urrragh!
As for your treatment, that’s both appalling and questionably ethical — things aren’t supposed to even qualify as disorders if they aren’t causing distress, intervering with functioning, or causing legal trouble (eg pedophilia).
Yeah, but the traditional treatment for multi is integration. I’ve actually had this argument with people before; they can not imagine multi NOT being intrinsically harmful. It becomes a massive No True Scotsman argument where I CAN’T be multi and functional at the same time. I’ve even trawled the psych journals, back in college, and I can’t find a single study with a decent sample size that proves to me integration WORKS.
Iirc you’re more functional as a result of being multi, Mac’s Mr. Get Shit Done right? (Either way, that’s bullshit)
Well, that made Mac laugh; he’s a notorious slacker. But yes, we are WAY healthier this way. I honestly think if we’d stayed singlet, we’d be dead.
I’m not completely anti-psych (I mean, let’s not discuss how much money I spent on most-of-a-degree in it) — and I’m legitimately diagnosable of the “causing distress” variety, but yeah, there are serious issues with the “and thus we won’t listen because we know better” part.
As for the DSM not removing homosexuality, I have a copy of DSM-III-R (1987), it isn’t on there. Looks like homosexuality was removed in 74, with “sexual orientation disorder” replacing it until “ego-dystonic homosexuality” replaced that in 1980, and then DSM-III-R did this —
Not a terribly long time ago, but before my brother was born, and before I was saying more than a half dozen words. So not exactly recently either.
/history of psychology pedantry
No real evidence, do it anyways! That sounds typical, yes (I’m looking at you “barely better than a placebo” DEATH RASH drug)
Wonder if you could set your booth up on public property nearby? On conference grounds would be a trespassing issue, but the public parking lot for the conference? That’d be fair game (though probably incredibly annoying to deal with)
Rogan and/or Mac — did I get you two mixed up AGAIN!?! I’m going to go sit in the corner of shame and think about what I’ve done. Sorry!
What utter bullshit. I assume it’s followed by an obstetrics conference for cis dudes.
RE: Argenti/PennyDreadful
Yeah, I recalled homosexuality being removed in the 70s. (I had an abnormal psych textbook from that time, and it mentioned it being removed.)
Yeah, multi has a very colorful psych history. There’s a reason integration has so much hype behind it, but how it happened is interesting, and has come under fire from many people. I know a lot about it, multi being my arena, but it’s neither here nor there. Suffice to say, there’s a lot of underlying theory behind the integration cure, and multis are notoriously difficult to find and hang onto long enough for such studies. (We’re like roaches, apparently, scattering and bolting at the first glimpse of light.) So it often gets defaulted on, without there actually being the research to back it up. With the amount of controversy around multi as a diagnosis, it’s hard to get the research going, far as I can tell. (There’s some argument over whether the damn state of being even exists, which is absurd.)
And don’t worry about it, Argenti. Mac’s the big slacker Southern Baptist horndog; I’m the workaholic system lint trap artist.
Oh, of course they were. And will be fooled again, and again, and again. I want to read the comments here because they’re always entertaining, and I just got done the one where AtomicGrizzly posted his bullshit. I really need to come here regularly again.
But as of now it’s almost 1AM over here, and I have to start reading A Dance with Dragons before I go to sleep. Night.
RE: Argenti
You do MMOs, right? You can think of us as a raiding party. I’m the tank, Mac’s buffer, Miranda’s healer, Gigi’s DPS, Sneak buffer/healer.
“So not exactly recently either.”
For me, “recently” means “within my lifetime” ; ) At any rate, I certainly have memory of homosexuality as being well outside the range of “normal” and “acceptable”. Hell, being born outside of wedlock was still considered a stigma. Considering the regressive attitudes I’ve watched reappear towards women, abortion, rape etc lately, I can see the word “bastard” taking on its old meaning any minute now : /
“We’re like roaches, apparently, scattering and bolting at the first glimpse of light.”
“There’s some argument over whether the damn state of being even exists, which is absurd.”
From what I recall, those are related things — can’t get enough multi’s to study = must OT really exist (you’d think people familiar with the issues of studying small populations would know better). Given this BS, small wonder that they can’t retain study participants. Who’d want to partake in a study that attempted to change you while ignoring your wishes? It’d be like claiming reparative therapy works because not enough GLBT people stayed in the study long enough to prove that it doesn’t work!
Add to that mess that my psych class, undergrad sure but still, ended up derailing into whether system members each have souls, and fuck. I think it just straight up confuses psychs that multiple people can share a body (love your car analogy btw).
Re: confusing you and Mac — I just reread your strips though, and the ok/not ok questions! It was a stupid mistake that I’ve made twice in under a week! So I’m glad it didn’t annoy you too much, but I still feel like a fool.
Damn you auto correct! “Must OT” => “must not”
“You do MMOs, right? You can think of us as a raiding party. I’m the tank, Mac’s buffer, Miranda’s healer, Gigi’s DPS, Sneak buffer/healer.”
Actually no, Kingdom Hearts is Square Soft/Enix, and VtM:B has a similar enough set up, so I get the idea more or less, but dps? (I have played LAN Diablo, MMOs just annoy me for some reason)
PennyDreadful — makes sense that “recently” would depend on your age, and I’m under 30 still, so the 80s are nothing like recently for me!
*groooooooan*
I love it. 🙂
Argenti, you actually looked up my “recently” date, I didn’t : ) So technically you would be correct!
LBT, the only thing I ever knew about multiples was from “Sybil”, so your list of Ok questions is pretty fascinating; I had no idea. Not having gone through your whole site, will you be offended if I interact with “LBT” here as one person?
I’m near the end of a psych degree, and haven’t heard talk of multiples at all. I guess because it’s rare.but the one thing that is always talked about is that distress is an indicator of disorder. And it doesn’t make sense to me that anyone would try to change a person who was functioning happily.
And I really meant, people who are functioning, sorry about that.
PennyDreadful — you thought I knew that off the top of my head? 🙂 Define recently however you like, I just wanted to clarify what it meant in the context of the DSM (also, I forked over $70 for DSM-IV-TR for class, so I have a dog in this fight)
And not to answer for LBT, but it’s usually Rogan posting, and since Rogan *is* one person…
lumi — I took clinical psych as an upper level elective, and that’s all I really remember it om, besides the brief paragraph version for abnormal psych (and yes, it’s on the test 🙂 )
Also, fucking Sybil, that’s a case study in what not to do. Her psych intended to publish her case while still treating her, and thus her treatment was affected by what would make good publishing material. It’s highly unethical to continue to treat someone you want to publish based on // to publish based on someone you’re still treating.
“ABNOY wants to fuck (around with) demons? Well that’s a whole new level of stupid, even for him.”
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HornyDevils
http://www.whiterosesgarden.com/Nature_of_Evil/Demons/List_of_Demons/R-S-T-U_contents/succubus.htm
Excerpt:
“Perhaps the most notorious fable was that spread by Walter Mapes, in his De Nugis Curialium [Courtier’s Trifles] (about 1185), concerning Gerbert of Aurillac, who became Pope Sylvester II (999-1003). As a young man, Gerbert fell in love with the daughter of the Provost of Rheims. The girl rejected him, and Gerbert despaired so long that he became impoverished and at his wit’s end. One day he came across a beautiful maiden seated on silks and surrounded by hoards of money. She told him her name was Meridiana, and that if he would only be faithful to her, he could possess her, her magickal knowledge, and her money. Gerbert gladly accepted and prospered rapidly, becoming Archbishop of Rheims, Cardinal, Archbishop of Ravenna, and ultimately Pope. All this time he secretly enjoyed the company of Meridiana every night, and was even forgiven by his succubus when the Provost’s daughter, finding him inebriated, seduced him.”