Sex Robots, Misogyny, and Artificial Intimacy in Contemporary Speculative Fiction: A Posthuman Feminist Analysis

This article offers a posthuman feminist analysis of contemporary literary fiction featuring sex dolls and robots, including Sierra Greer's Annie Bot (2024), Jeanette Winterson's Frankissstein (2019), and Paolo Bacigalupi's “Mika Model” (2016). It examines how the design and commodification of artificial sexual companions reproduce cultural misogyny, sustain gender inequality, and reinforce feminised technological servitude. Drawing on Kathleen Richardson's critique of the sex robot and situating these texts alongside contemporary misogynistic discourse associated with figures such as Nick Fuentes and Andrew Tate, the article situates speculative fiction in direct relation to ongoing social and ideological formations. It argues that these works move beyond a feminist critique of sex robots as misogynistic commodities by tracing a progression from commodified spectacle to demands for recognition in the face of exploitation and, finally, to emergent autonomy, which recasts the sex robot as a contested figure suspended between objectification and ethical subjectivity.