


What shameless subterfuge.

What sniveling, sneaky duplicity.

No, I'm not talking about all the married men who signed up for infidelity dating site Ashley Madison.

I'm referring to the heinous accusation that not all of the women who signed up for the site were, well, women.

Instead, as Reuters reports, it seems that Ashley Madison may have used fembots.

Yes, robots dressed up as women.

Dressed up in the emotional sense, you understand.

Outrage has rained down up the dating site since it got hacked, details of its members were revealed and class action lawsuits that accused its parent company Avid Life Media of classless behavior were filed.

But the mere idea that someone on a dating site might not be who you think they are?

How perilously painful.

These fembots, according to an Ernst and Young report that was actually commissioned by Avid, would chat up unsuspecting men.

Which might lead you to several conclusions.

One, married men seem not to be able to tell the difference between a robot and a woman.

Two, artificial intelligence is making vast strides, isn't it?

Three, just how many married men come on to Siri late at night?

And four, isn't this merely a picture of our future?

It's not as if we're so satisfied with each other these days. It's not as if human-to-human love is being spread around the world like Lovebird Flu.

Let's face it, we've started talking to machines in public. Isn't the notion of a fembot just a tiny step in that direction?

Robot sex is a coming thing.

This is something of which robot manufacturers are already aware. Why, those who buy Softbank's emotionally aware Pepper robot must promise not to have sex with him/her/it.

It's not as if Ashley Madison might have had an exclusive on fembots anyway.

If you've ever been on a dating site, you'll sometimes get the sense that women who claim to like you have a peculiarly stilted way of communicating their affection.

Increasingly, relationships only exist in order to make us feel good. It may well be that Ashley's Madison fembots made men feel so very good indeed.

It's unclear, indeed, how many Ashley Madison members ever met in person.

How many Ashley Madison dates were there? Did the site celebrate Ashley Madison marriages? These would be glorious events that split up a couple of families, all for the greater pleasure of the two parties concerned.

Moreover, if a married man or woman want to have an affair, is there a special attraction to have one with another married man or woman?

Will they be more understanding? Or will they actually bring more complication, as you both scurry around trying to avoid detection?

That's why fembots -- and manbots -- present a cleaner, more satisfying future.

You know where you stand. You know what each party's role is. And you know that this is a simple transaction.

In any case, we'll all soon be at least part-robot if some at Google have their way.

So we'd better learn the robot language now, right?

Published on: Jul 5, 2016