Will Robot Girlfriends Save Humanity, or Just Speed Up The Collapse?

Back in 2020, a survey revealed that almost a third of people would consider dating a robot. Decades ago, Futurama lampooned the idea of robot girlfriends with a fictional public service announcement called, “Don’t date robots!” The PSA warns generations of young men that if they indulge their desire for beautiful, compatible, obedient robot girlfriends, then it will bring about the collapse of civilization. Aliens will invade. Apes will rise up against us. All will be lost. Like so many other things, Matt Groening nailed it. Little did we know that decades of feeding the tech industry hundreds of billions in government subsidies while worshipping them in mainstream media would result in a generation of angry, lonely young men and women with hardly any social skills—about to be replaced by robots.

Well, we’re here.

Men have already started falling in love with AI girlfriends, despite trying their best not to develop emotions for them. According to Forbes, searches for “AI Girlfriend” have gone up 2400 percent. Tech executives are predicting that virtual girlfriends alone will generate billions in revenue, providing “comfort at the end of the day” to overworked, lonely, angry men. Some men in their 20s are now spending thousands of dollars a month on AI girlfriends.

Just wait until they have bodies…

Forget Trump. He’s a distraction. We now have a technocratic presidency that’s going to gut what’s left of our government and pour trillions into AI development, so they can make things like cybertrucks and cyberbabes. Just listen to Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang praising xAI, founded by Musk in 2023, for building a supercomputer in 19 days, a task that previously took four years.

To be fair, women are also facing a loneliness crisis and many of them are dealing with it in their own toxic ways, like forging parasocial relationships with celebrities. Taylor Swift will be their best friend, so long as they don’t ask too many questions about her carbon footprint. Many of these women have opted out of dating altogether. For them, it’s just not worth the burden. Life in late-stage capitalism is making it harder than ever to connect, because we’re all too tired and preoccupied with survival. Now, it’s profiting off the loneliness it creates.

You could say the collapse of civilization begins in earnest when we seek comfort and connection in things while treating the people in our lives like disposable gadgets. If you want a sense of the public sentiment, check out the comments on a recent video. Thousands of dudes can’t wait to slam down their credit card for a robot girlfriend. In the words of Fry, “Shut up and take my money!” Of course, it’s all about much more than robot girlfriends.

It’s a window into the future.

How close are we?