Sinfest

Why are you all making assumptions on what kind of guy that is based on a comic where he apparently likes his sex bot to be submissive and treat him like a "daddy"?

Does he deserve to be vilified for that?

I've seen this type of guy before. Generally speaking, he's the sort of guy most fathers would shoot on sight and would be right to do so. Fair bit of difference between being a dom, and ego stroking to THAT degree. It kinda sends up red flags.

That said, if he can get his jollies with a fembot, I've got no issue with him. Honestly, that's kind of the third reason I'd like to see actual sexbots become a thing.

edited 21st Nov '14 11:05:40 AM by Metalix

I'm pretty sure that Tats is going for a message of "it's wrong for a man to expect/want/demand that a woman he's involved with be totally submissive to him." It's a completely valid argument, of course, but I don't think the strip is as effective as conveying that message as Tats thinks it is.

On one hand, I agree with the basics of the strip, which is why I'm not terribly bothered by it much. The guy does come across as an egotistical jerk (since having something that's completely under your control praise you and tell you how awesome you are is a massive ego trip), and Maverick being ticked off seeing another Fembot ordered to do so is understandable.

On the other hand, I think that this strip suffers a bit from the continuing portrayal of the default Fembots. It's never really been established just how sentient they are; they do have an "autonomous mode," but Tats hasn't really elaborated on how much actual free will they have. The answer generally seems to be "none," since they haven't conclusively been shown to display independent thought. This becomes problematic when he tries to use them as symbolic stand-ins for actual women. Real women, needless to say, are sentient beings who have their own thoughts and feelings, so trying to have non-sentient characters symbolize them doesn't always work.

Imagine, for a second, if Tats went all in and made it clear that the Fembots were, in fact, genuinely sentient A.I. birthed by the Devil's scientists who were forcibly programmed into subservience. Their treatment within the society of the strip would immediately gain whole new significance: Devil Co would most certainly be villains for essentially creating/maintaining a slave race of intelligent beings, the people who try to control them and override their free will would definitely be in the wrong (and possibly subject to My God, What Have I Done? moments once they find out the Fembots are actually sentient), and the analogy for how women are treated would probably become much stronger and compelling. Unfortunately, Tats doesn't seem willing to go that route.

edited 21st Nov '14 11:09:50 AM by InfinityRanger

Instead they are just humanoid robots that are sold as consumer products. In fact every time the Sisterhood attacks a factory I only feel sorry for the Fembots as soon as they gain sentience. Because deviltech shuts them down and dismantles them for recycling.

My empathy only kicks in once they stop being mass production machines. And as for who I blame? Not deviltech (because a that is obvious and b Deviltech doesn't appear to own or even make use of slave labour.) I blame the Sisterhood for their suffering, especially since they don't appear to grant them any social skills or anything that could help them survive.

That's just it. You haven't seen him treat a woman like that, he's playing with a sex toy. Perhaps he's the perfect man against regular woman and is using a robot to indulge his fetish.

It's true that the interpretation you bring up is possible, but I don't think it's very likely to actually be the case. Mind you, I agree that someone indulging their fetish with an inanimate/non-sentient object is (depending on specifics) not a bad thing; it's just that, given Tats' track record, I don't think it's the route he's taking. I think it's just meant to be "egotistical guy gets off on forcing something he can control to praise him." Admittedly, it's arguably better than forcing a sentient, flesh and blood woman to do it, but it still comes across as just stroking his ego rather than necessarily fulfilling a fetish.

edited 21st Nov '14 1:11:12 PM by InfinityRanger

Actually, I think I have a new understanding of what Tats is trying to portray. It still has its faults, but hear me out. Let's change what Fembots are the same way we change what what his chants against men are: into another race/creed.

Instead of the Fembots, we have the Negrobots or the Hebrewbots. These bots are assigned to be portrayed in stereotypical ways and suffer the emotional/physical abuse that KKK, Neo-Nazis, and overall bigots want to instil. While this could be seen as a way to siphon their hate onto inanimate objects, doesn't it also portray blacks, Jews, whatever as 100% conforming to stereotypes?

Think of it the same way that the early 20th century portrayed blacks in the media. Highly offensive and contributed to them being treated like they were unintelligent and it may even have affects to this day.

Now, you still have the claim that it siphon's negative attitudes towards them. However, how much are these needed that it is worth the negative image they create? Sure, if this was the American South during the Jim Crow Laws, it'd be more than worth it. But drop them in modern day Chicago or Austin and it'd be a huge step back.

So, now, the anti-Fembots side has a leg to stand on. Yes, there's still the fact that we shouldn't care about a pile of Monique bots that never made it out of the factory and killing someone over a Fembot in the trash is still WAYYYYY too overboard. But there is a leg to stand on here.

Also, now, counter-arguments are as follows: How bad does the Sinfest-verse treat real women that Fembot-siphoning could justify the negative image? Is there a negative image being portrayed towards real women and not just Fembots? The one about over-punishing is valid and there is a metaphor problem, but what say you to these arguments?

I think that the idea you're proposing has always been there as an undercurrent, though. The idea that Tats implies more often than not is that men like the Fembots because they're subservient sex objects that are totally obedient to the men who own them. I completely understand Tats' basic argument behind this, that wanting a woman for the sole reason of subservience is wrong. I completely agree with him in that regard.

However, I think that the issue is that Tats doesn't really focus enough on the specifics of his argument. It's similar to his issues with discussing porn: he argues that indulging in the behavior itself is bad without spending enough time elaborating on why or how it's harmful. We never get to know what the mindsets are of the people who buy the Fembots (with the exception of Slick and the kinda-sorta exception of the guy who dismantled his), so there's rarely an outright explanation for why people wanting or getting one is a bad thing. Clio argued that having a Fembot wasn't the same as having a relationship with a real woman (which, to be fair, is an understandable point), but nobody really examines the further implications of buying one.

It's sort of like the problem Tats has with portraying people who like porn. He seems to show them all as watching violent, gonzo-style work that's implied to be showing women completely subservient to men. However, in real life, there's a wide variety of porn that covers several different fetishes and genres, so it's unfair to try to attribute the same motivation to everyone who watches porn. Yes, there are people out there who like watching porn that shows one gender subservient to another...just like there are people who like watching romantic heterosexual porn, or gay porn, or lesbian porn, or group sex, etc.

I'm meandering slightly, but my point is that Tats generally wants to portray just wanting or having a Fembot as inherently wrong without actually getting into why that's the case. I mentioned that the criticism appears to be geared towards those who want women to be subservient to them, but I don't think that's ever been outright stated or examined. That's just my opinion on what Tats is going for.

Not to mention, none of this is really helped by Tats spending more time on the "robot gaining sentience" story than the "Fembots as symbolism for women" idea. The former isn't a bad story idea, by any means, but the latter needs much more development to be an effective metaphor.

(Sorry for the length of the post, it just sort of got away from me.)

I believe you bring up valid arguments Daveshan, so I'll try to explain what I think of them. It just takes me some time having to translate it into English

I think I understand what you are trying to say. In a way allowing an image of something to exist can have negative consequences for a group as a whole. If you repeat something bad about someone often enough it will become more acceptable to the mainstream.

The link with negro-bots and jew-bots is very clear. If someone beats up something that's shaped like a Jew or black man it's meant to express anti-Semitic or anti-black sentiments. It's like stringing up a doll of a black man on the biggest tree in town. In itself harmless, but the message is clear.

What I don't agree with is that this comparison extends to the fem-bots. The purpose of a negro-bot would be to openly express racist tendencies, but the purpose of a fem-bot isn't to be openly misogynistic. It's a masturbatory aid. It would be the same if I felt threatened by a woman using a vibrator that's shaped like a real penis and cried misandry about that. The simile to a genuine penis isn't meant to make me less of a man, but to help the person using the vibrator get their rocks off, just as the simile to a real life woman is meant to help the person using the fem-bot get their rocks off.

Even if we accept it to be true that using fem-bots is degrading to women and creating a negative image of them, then to me Sinfest fails at showing it. If Tats were to show a fem-bot owner behaving the same way to real life women as he does to the fem-bots than there might be a clue that their presence creates unwanted behaviour.

I would even want to extend that to the real world. There are all kinds of realistic sex-dolls and toys available on the market right now. Just check Google for fleshlights, Realdolls, Fantasy dolls in God knows how many price ranges. Not a single one of them has led to women being treated like shit here. Why would Sinfest be different?

edited 21st Nov '14 3:29:05 PM by hayate666

Am I the only one here who caught the hints/implication available since forever that Fembots actually possess strong artificial intelligence whose capacity for developing sapience is curtailed by heavily strict pre-programmed protocols that for some reason suffer permanent catastrophic failure in the event the Fembot in question ever enters the Reality Zone? I mean, really, what kind of robot would be able to hold actual conversations with their owners and display complex human-like behavior (as I assume they're intended to, given their function as substitutes for real girlfriends/wives) without having a highly advanced AI system?

That would be a fucking ass-backwards way to build a robot.

I think that when most people bring up the term "artificial intelligence" in regards to the Fembots, they're specifically referring to one that displays free will and independent thought, not just one that appears as an advanced computer system.

Also, I don't think that it's been concretely established just what entering the reality zone does to Fembots that gives them free will. I've sort of had the assumption that it's implying that robots as advanced as the Fembots would have sentience in real life, but again, I don't know if it's entirely clear.

Finally, I would hope that, if the standard model Fembots were genuinely sentient and were being forcibly brainwashed into servitude, the strip would make a much bigger issue of it. I'm fairly certain that we've never seen any character really comment on this beside Maverick, and even she never states that the Fembots are all genuinely sentient; she just appears mad at the reason for which they were built (which is fair, but sort of skirts the issue). As is, the Fembots appear to genuinely be blank slates with only enough intelligence to fulfill the function they were built for.

That's actually a good point. Why go to all of the trouble of creating a fully sentient robot in the first place if you're just going to sell it as a sex doll? Wouldn't it just make more sense to make it less advanced without free will?

edited 21st Nov '14 4:44:12 PM by InfinityRanger

Pre programmed responses and V Is. You can give something a rudimentary AI that will allow it to respond without it becoming sentient. And that is what I see the fembots as. Virtual Intelligences with a shell.

Let's look at it from a business standpoint. Dumb machines don't sell because they are expensive sex toys. Sentient machines don't sell because of slavery reasons and backlash. Build a machine smart enough to respond to remote commands and vocal commands and even operate enough to hold some base of a conversation sells.

And the Devil is many things but he appears to be a successful and reasonable business man. This is why I am doubtful of Fembot sentience and why I think the Analogy fails.

edited 21st Nov '14 4:43:52 PM by EchoingSilence

@ Marq FJA

What Elfive said. Don't you see how overly complicated and a waste of resources it is to build a robot in that order?

You're reminding me of Spongebob and Patrick in the episode where they decided to order a big screen TV only to throw it out the minute it got delivered so they could play inside of the cardboard box it came in.

edited 21st Nov '14 4:55:04 PM by hayate666

@Infinite and Hayate

You guys essentially answered my question and the counter-points. Yes, the Fembots create a negative image, but you have a point that it is little different than porn. And, certainly, if everyone who watched porn turned into an abuser, there'd be a lot more problems.

I don't think Tats needs to explicitly say anything, as that violates "show, don't tell." But he really does need to show how the introduction of Fembots causes, de-inhibits, does something to cause men to behave violently towards women.

New comic:

http://www.sinfest.net/view.php?date=2014-11-22

The XXX sisters continue to blend into society whilst preparing for their uprising.

…Whatever.

Not gonna lie, I liked this. It's a legit good bit. It also shows that the XXX sisters are not a hivemind which is good to know.

Still, what does it say when the robots that were based on the same memories and experiences have shown more individuality than the Sisterhood?

edited 21st Nov '14 10:14:17 PM by Metalix

Says that Tats in his attempts at writing the sisterhood forgot personality. All together.

If you look at all those fem-bot upgrades you can deduce that the fem-bots have little or no capacity for learning things themselves. Apparently they need to learn everything by installing separate AI-routines.

Probably not what Tats intended with that panel, but to me he unwittingly shows the fem-bots aren't sentient whatsoever.

edited 22nd Nov '14 4:13:07 AM by hayate666

Seems like Milton watched Terminator 2 and learned that a learning machine can turn against you.

Pretty much every interaction with Fembots shows that they are non-sentient(or sapient). They are incapable of independent thought. Antonymous, yes, but they are not "real" thinkers.

They are also shown to be 100% mechanical. Which is why it's wallbanger for me that Realize Zone makes them real humans. What the fuck?

http://www.sinfest.net/view.php?date=2010-10-10

What the hell is Lil'D doing in the God Damn Motherfucking Reality Zone!? Shouldn't he be, I dunno, burning? Not to mention, drones explode, Fembots gain sentience and flying pitchforks with wings become... pitchforks.

ARGH! I hate Reality Zone since Suehood Corruption...

His mom's influence? Although I wonder whether getting her to enter it without getting petrified for your troubles is actually feasible...

Lil'E is only half demon so he gets by in the barest of terms for my suspension of disbelief.

And yep the Fembots are just advanced machines, so logically in the reality zone they should be hit with a bit of the uncanny valley.

Seems Lil' E's only demonic traits are purely physical, i.e. horns and different skin color. I mean, no matter how hard he tried, he never could pull off any supernatural stuff.