I am a ...
Gendering ... just a prelude?
Gendern – I published this article about a perspective on gendering on Linkedin in August 2022.
I am a very open-minded person. For me, the individual has played a role since childhood, not skin color, hair color, gender or other genetic predispositions. I know people of all colors, nations and orientations. For me, a person has always simply been a person whom I try to show respect through my actions. That has worked very well for 54 years.
This childishly carefree thought shaped my actions until recently, without me realizing it. Until current events hit my world view with full force. I was used to things being allowed to develop organically in a free and democratic organization. Everything can, as little as possible must. In the last 2.5 years, I have been proven wrong in many ways. Less and less can, more and more must. And at a pace as if the world would end tomorrow.
Gendering and the "we" feeling
At the heart of the whole discussion, including about gendering, is a daily propagated sense of “us” alongside fear. Pandemic, environment, gender issues, war, etc.. Suddenly the “I” has to give way to a “we”, otherwise you are anti-social and above all to blame if “we” all go under. But this is a paradox in itself. Because the “we” is made up of millions of “I”, and if these are no longer allowed to be individual, we only have one “I” that presents itself on stage disguised as a “we”. We also forget that someone has to define what “we” are supposed to do in order to be “we”. However, this someone is an “I” or at least a group of people who propagate their “I” as a guideline for the general “we”. The “we” then emerges from a few “I “s to form the new “we”.
Example: In principle, it always seems plausible that “we” also take the needs of individual people into consideration. People, for example, who feel more emotionally as a gendered “man” than a woman and vice versa. Or people who are emotionally torn and cannot categorize themselves. All of these people have a story that needs to be taken seriously.
But … they expect the collective “we” to be oriented towards their “I”, which puts them above the currently existing “we”. An “I” therefore demands the “we”. I don’t see this as positive or negative, I just want to point this out.
At this point, I would like to turn the discussion to another aspect, as I have asked myself why all these developments have been initiated or pushed forward at high speed over the last 2.5 years. Why is this discussion being thrown at an already insecure and divided population, why are influencers being fed and why is massive PR being carried out without actually having a widely discussed concept of how to show these people respect without following a path prescribed by subtle force?
Human rights for humanoids?
One thought came to mind very quickly, but I had avoided communicating it at all costs due to the current discussion about gendering until I came across an article from the University of Würzburg (my home town). This article fueled my thoughts that the discussion about gendering could just be a prelude or even a Trojan horse to bring AI and robots into this gender discussion in the near future and to give them an emotional and legally manifested place in society. So at its core, it may not be about these minorities at all, but about something completely different.
Too crazy? Anyone who relegates this to the realm of conspiracy theory should first read the scientific article linked at the end entitled: “Respect for robots”.
Excerpt:
“It is obvious that we need to organize human-robot interaction according to ethical and legal principles, principles that optimize human benefit and minimize potential harm. For example, avoiding disrespectful treatment of robots could help to preserve a normative ethical continuum in human behavior. In other words, those who treat humanoid robots with respect will also retain respect for humans. Those who treat robots disrespectfully may also become brutal in their dealings with humans.”
Honestly, the last 2 sentences scare me. New “black/white pigeonholes” are already clearly being created here, into which people should be put if they are skeptical or hostile towards robots, just as was/is the case with critical views on the pandemic, climate change, gendering, Ukraine, etc. Or to put it another way: It has already been determined that the future “we” will include the socially unquestioning acceptance and equality of humanoids, and humanoids will therefore become part of a new “we”.
Now this may not be a problem for many people. But is that all there is to it? Most of the older ones among us still remember that cute little egg that we humanized, cared for, fed and mothered, the Tamagotchi. If it worked for a small egg, then it will work even more for stylish, AI-controlled humanoids with supposedly human features. Social distancing has also played its part in banishing the need for human warmth from the “we”.
Progress for the human species?
It is interesting that, on the one hand, we are introducing new forms of communication at high speed in order to meet the most diverse human demands in terms of language and, at the same time, we are already postulating that aggression against robots automatically results in aggression against humans. This discussion has been introduced in elementary school and the topic has been unreservedly baked into the next generation.
I’m sure I’ll be labeled an “eternal yesterday” by fans of this development. But that would also be a sign of how manipulatively the term “progress” is used today.
It sounds strange to me that “progress” means that we as humans are taking “steps backwards”. We can no longer cook and have children without an app, modern technology or at least books, walking is becoming unattractive because we have electric scooters, bicycles have electric motors and crafts are being replaced by 3D printers and robots. Is it progress if we only work to eliminate the need for a physically functioning body?
Technically, this is certainly progress, but not for the human species if progress means total dependence on it.
And if human rights, the decisive difference between machines and humans, are also to fall, then a “point of no return” will be reached.
And if you still have a Tamagotchi, you should be aware of one thing: The cute little thing might sue for care in the future.
Gender debate as a test run?
For me, the current gender debate seems like a test run to prepare us emotionally for accepting robots and humanoids or even formless artificial intelligence as equal members of society endowed with “human rights” in the future.
Of course, this is just the prediction of a single “me”, my “me”, and I would like nothing more than to be wrong. But perhaps the “we” in our society really does want to say goodbye to the “me” bit by bit, because it is more comfortable, or because it is becoming increasingly difficult to be “me”, or because it is actually considered the right thing to do. First the convinced, then the comfortable, then the weak … and then maybe we’ll see what’s left of the “I”!
“Freedom always dies by the centimeter!” Karl-Hermann Flach/Guido Westerwelle
