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SEX ROBOTS AND GENDER RELATIONS: MARKETING HOSPITALITY SERVICES IN THE FUTURE ECONOMY
Few species on this planet partake in sex for recreational purposes and humans are one of them. What is noteworthy is that humans are the only species with the capability to develop advanced technologies to satiate the need for recreational sex. At present, there are massive advances in technologies in robotics that would suggest that it will not be long before sex work will be robotised. This large jump in technological capabilities brings up ethical, legal, and practical issues with regards to the commercialization of sex, something previously explored by some scholars (See, for example; Döring, Mohseni & Walter,2020; Mackenzie, 2016; Makenzie, 2018; Klein & Lin, 2018). There is a growing literature that deals with how sex robots will be incorporated into the tourism and hospitality industries (see, for example; Yeoman & Mars, 2012). As sex robots become increasingly sophisticated, the ethics, social debate, and practicalities of their incorporation into society will have to be thought through, especially as their impact will not be gender neutral. While the historical roots of the modern mechanization of sex were gynocentric, the current technological innovations are largely aimed at a male consumer. In this research, the authors discuss the state of the art in sex robots, the practical aspects of the incorporation of sex robots into the field of hospitality and tourism, and the impact that such a technological jump will have upon sex tourism and its contribution to the sustainable development of destinations with a transformation of sex tourism into a new paradigm. The authors will conclude explaining the ways in which this technological innovation will impact upon males and females and the interactions between the genders, transforming human connections and hospitality. This research will be the first to discuss how the digital aspects of the new generation of sex robots will impact upon the marketing of automated sex services, since the intimate nature of the supply of services will require marketing finesse unlike other more openly disseminated hospitality services.
