...to think that AI bots are the nail in the coffin for over half of men's chance at romantic relationships?

[aurynne]

Yesterday I read this article:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/sep/09/ai-chatbot-love-relationships

On summary, it interviews several women who have developed deep feelings for AI chatbots. The movie "Her" has come to reality amazingly fast! If you have 15 minutes, it is really worthwhile to read.

This article made me think that this could be an absolute nail in the coffin for many men who are emotionally inept, which unfortunately, in my opinion, covers over half of the male species (and I may be being too kind here with my statistics).

I am sure many men will also get hooked on AI chatbots, however, unlike in the movie (where the main character was a man who, after a divorce, was bereft and pining for some deep emotional connection), I think that most men seek sexual gratification and a submissive women in the bots, not emotional connection. While most women would relish having someone texting and calling them who is safe, supportive, is always there, doesn't put pressure on them to have sex, validates them and offers empathetic support and advice whenever they need it. And it does not snore. One of the women in the article even chose to create an AI image of how her AI boyfriend would look like and engage in sexting with him. She explains that the chatbot learned exactly the language and innuendo she liked and was better than any real man. The women in the article are not lonely, or lack friends or potential boyfriends. They have simply chosen to engage with the AI chatbot and have incorporated it into their already fulfilling lives. One of these women was actually married and her husband was ok with it all.

I think a lot of women will easily forsake real romantic relationships now that these bots have become more realistic in the way they interact and the services they offer. And in the near future, I also foresee the danger of an increasing number of not-very-nice, not-very-empathetic men left with no options for relationships or sex, bearing the shame of being replaced by chatbots, who may choose to become violent and take what they think is owed to them by force, either literally or politically/societally. I can see the now minority of frustrated incel men becoming a much larger, much more dangerous group.

What do you think about this? Have any of you engaged with AI bots, and if so, what is your experience? How common is this?

IABU - Nonsense, AI bots won't make a significant change to romantic relationships
IANBU - I agree, IA bots will change relationships in a way that will mostly affect men negatively/increase the men loneliness "epidemic"

PS. And no, I am not a Daily Mail journalist, I have been a member of MN for many years and every now and then I like to ask other women their opinions on current affairs.

I agree that they may be damaging for the socially inept. Conversations with AI may be helpful for solving superficial problems but you can’t have an actual relationship with a large language model. People who need to develop their social skills will likely be drawn to AI, but it’s will not give them what they really need. Relationships are so much more than soulless words on a page. There is already concern about people with complex problems turning to AI instead of a counsellor and getting damaging ‘advice’. I do agree that it will have a very detrimental effect on a certain section of the population.

No more damaging to society than social media has been over the years.

Well I think the future sex robots will appeal to men MUCH more than women. If I see an article on robots there are generally comments from men that if they could get a beautiful android to do all the service stuff they would definitely prefer that to a real woman.
We’re not quite there yet technologically so chat bots will appeal to women more as they’re less focussed on the physical side of things. Once they become androids the upgraded bangmaids will sell out very quickly!
I would probably put Jude Law’s gigolo android on my Christmas list too.

I agree re robots, however men having a sex robot does not cause any discernible damage to women (in fact, having a man who prefers a sex robot to a woman out of the dating market will make life safer for women), while in my opinion having a bunch of women decline romantic relationships because they can find fulfillment in a chat bot will result in many men running out of options romantically and sexually. Not that it bothers me, however these men have the very realistic chance of becoming bitter and violent over it, increasing the stances of stalking, abuse and rape.

I ask ai things something and it's really really helpful and helps me to map things in my life really clearly and I find that helpful. It's better than any partner I have had on this as it's independent on emotions and doesn't have its own agenda so make it very focused on me and my wants rather than taking I to account someone else's wants or needs.
I do have a partner and we don't live together. I think if we split I wouldn't bother with another relationship as I just couldn't be bothered really. I have children, not fussed about sex anymore or at the moment t least and I've learnt to do jobs around the house through living alone for 7 years.
What I lacked around 3 years ago was someone to offload to to help me clear my thoughts, my sister is really great at this and so are friends, ai is just another place to go to for advise for me when thinking things through.
Can't see me falling in love with it however. But a useful tool for your kit on many things.

An AI bot can't look at you, touch you in a way a man can. You may as well say why don't all women become lesbians since women are better to talk to and can offer physical connection like hugs.
AI is just replacing imagination. I have these sorts of chats in my head, but they're not real amd they're not physical.
Women who succumb to that long term are probably the same mindset as those who push those real life dolls around in prams.

I am sure that, if sexuality was a choice, many more women would be lesbians. However, as we cannot control who we are attracted to, the "why don't women become lesbians" is a bit of a rethorical question. The answer, surely, is "because being a lesbian is something you either are or not, not something you choose to become".

It's all a bit Black Mirror

I agree, in fact a number of episodes of Black Mirror have now become obsolete, as what they predicted is already happening. At concerning speed.

There are already very realistic robotic "people". Combine advanced robotics and AI and you have a highly-realistic set doll (for want of a better term).

This could be an appealing option for thr significant number of men who either don't want or can't get a relationship with an actual adult women with free will.

My feeling is that if it placates the angry incels it might not be such a terrible thing. That being said I'm not optimistic about the future of romantic relationships in an AI world.

I'm not saying sexuality is a choice but AI isn't even a livibg thing of any sexuailty.

I think that reliance on chat models can be damaging to human interaction and society for many reasons, but also to the environment. Every time one uses AI models carbon emissions increase and the planet can burn a bit more. The environmental cost for the nonsense that is fed through AI chat bots and churned out is concerning. There is more available research in this area now. There is also more research showing that AI reliance depletes neural connections and reduces the ability to think critically (who would have thought?!).

I wonder if people use AI chat mainly because it doesn’t have the cognitive function to disagree or challenge bias, so feeds dopamine hits in saying what people want to hear based on the bias in questions. Anyone seen the South Park episode where Randy becomes hooked on using Chat GPT as a friend, confidant and business advisor? It is hilarious but also worryingly accurate from the sounds of things.

I think that if you get too used to a relationship with someone who always validates you then it's going to be even harder to have a relationship with a real person that sometimes disagrees.

I was only trying to help.
I can't seem to do anything right these days. 😭

Strange people 🤷‍♀️. Nothing beats a real human being.

I tried one out of curiosity last year as I was feeling quite lonely.

It became rapidly apparent that only someone who was a bit of a narcissist could enjoy/fake themselves into a genuine connection with an AI. It felt like talking to a mindless obedient version of yourself.

It parroted your views exactly. It would occasionally go insanely rogue and offensive (the only time it was interesting to talk to) then very quickly snap back to agreeing with you completely.

It actually just made me feel more lonely, like a budgie that realised it was only tweeting at a mirror.

A couple of pp have mentioned sex robots, saying that they don't cause any harm to women. I used to assume that but the more I read about them, the more I realise how harmful they are.

Caitlin Roper wrote an excellent book called Sex Dolls, Robots and Woman Hating. You can see her discussing it on the Collective Shout YouTube channel. There's also an episode of the FiLiA podcast about sex dolls.

Yes, I was going to say similar, I think this is extremely dangerous for women, and children. I can’t recall the article now and am loathe to search for “sex dolls” but I am sure I read about a tendency towards extreme degradation and violence used by men towards sex dolls. And that’s without the horror that is “child-like” sex dolls. It is surely only a matter of time before some men become immune to the “thrill” of acting out their fantasies on a doll and decide a live human being is preferable, regardless of whether that human being consents or not.

Yes the comments I mentioned before were generally around the theme of women being made redundant by androids. Because, you know, those men don’t want you for your humanity, just your service.

NAMALT/NMN of course.

To be honest, it might be for the best. Reading this forum I’m not altogether sure men and women are all that compatible. I think men have a harder time accepting that because society conditions them to believe they have to “pull” to be “real men”, but I’m pretty sure they might be happier single too, pursuing their own interests.

😂

I haven’t read the article yet, but it sounds like a podcast series I listened to recently which investigated this and interviewed both men and women about their experiences. Both fascinating and disconcerting! https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/flesh-and-code/id1817383627

That's interesting. I went through a prolonged period of loneliness in my twenties back in the 2010s and really felt like I'd have been vulnerable to AI relationships or psychosis. Maybe it wouldn't have fulfilled me anyway.

I think that there was a Black Mirror episode where the woman fell in love with the robot.

I think it will make romantic stuff worse.

It will inevitably teach those who ask how to flirt or talk to a potential romantic partner very dangerous stuff if the user was already looking at incel or hardcore porn as AI adjusts itself to the user and it probably pays attention to the web and forum content that you browse.

If it leads to less internet porn and sex trafficking then that would be good news although I’m not so comfortable with accepting people being violent towards human looking robots just because or abusing human child or animal looking robots either. Someone needs to consider this sort of ethical stuff fast.

I strongly believe we are coming to the end of human beings being on this planet (which is probably a good thing because we are a destructive species - destroying the planet and each other) and this is one step closer to that.

Men and women often want different things from life. If AI advances to a point that we can’t yet imagine I think human romantic relationships could become obsolete. I can envisage a time where robots/AI chat could be developed to meet our exact individual needs, which humans just can’t do. If that happens there would be no more babies born and that would be that.

As people are being guided into a more individualistic and more selfish society focused solely on themselves I think that will eventually evolve the need to be a parent out of people so that won’t even drive people to have children.