The Feminization of AI
This blog post is adapted from an assignment Sarah wrote for Gender Issues in Counseling at NC State in Summer 2022, shortly following the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.
“What topic should I write about?” was twirling around in my head as my 4th load of laundry started twirling around in the dryer. Just home from 3 weeks out of town with an epic pile of laundry, and then my 4 year old gets a stomach flu in the night – I won’t go into gory detail, but I lost track of how many loads of laundry I did last Friday. 8 may be a safe guess?
Laundry and motherhood could definitely be a paper topic, I thought as I folded onesies into Marie Kondo-style rows. I’m in a group text with 3 middle school friends turned mom friends, and we often lament the loads that clutter our lives – a burden that we as women in our heterosexual relationships carry exclusively, despite us all thinking of our relationships as “egalitarian.” Eve Rodsky explores this topic in her book “Fair Play,” where the author explores how women take on the majority of domestic responsibilities even when both partners work outside of the home. Somehow I squeezed in this read in the past couple of years between loads of laundry.
I text the group about my impossible sisyphean task. Empathy and support ding back at me as I continue to fold. Then my friend Nora texts me this picture of a sign she saw at a little gift shop at the beach. It reads, “Alexa, do my laundry.”
Ah, Alexa. Then up to the surface comes my “thing” about Alexa: WHY are the AI we love to use and abuse, hate and dump on, order around with no please or thank you (I mean, they are robots afterall) given female names and voices?
Alexa. Siri. The lady on the GPS before Siri took her job. Even when we’re not consciously thinking of these tools as human, every time we use these functions there is some reinforcement of the principle that a woman is thanklessly doing our bidding. Everytime someone angrily shouts back at Siri out of frustration (we’ve all been there, right?) we are shouting at a symbolic woman whose only job is to attend to us.
“Alexa, do the laundry.”
As the mother in this house, even in the 21st century, I am the household Alexa.
Picture a room full of marketing executives making decisions on these robotic functions. Did you picture a group of white men? Because I did. I wonder if they discussed the gendering of Alexa. I wonder if they ran a focus group, and if people were more likely to use the most feminine version. I wonder if it was subconscious, or automatic. I wonder if they thought of their mothers.
In using these tools daily, do we as consumers think of the feminization of these AI voices, or is it just me? We’re living in a time when the symbolic use of these robotic women is an echo of the direction of our societal view as women as a whole. “Alexa, carry this fetus.” I think it makes a lot of sense that thinking about my pet peeve about gendered robots this week sparked my inspiration to get up on my soap box. Robots imitating life.
In my counseling work focusing on the perinatal population, I am working with women adjusting to very dramatic identity shifts in their roles as mothers. In a way, they become Alexas, each cry from their newborn bringing a demand they must respond to. “Alexa, change my diaper.” “Alexa, bring me milk.” “Alexa, sing ‘You are my sunshine’ on repeat.” Parenthood also brings a shift in dynamics between my clients and their partners. Common themes around balance (or lack thereof) in caretaking tasks are identified by most of my clients. Encouraging clients to communicate with their partners is of course key. Validating anger, and yes – rage – as a common experience in motherhood is also important. The impossibly heavy load of all the perinatal period entails is so much for women to carry, even in very wanted and planned pregnancies, even in very stable partnerships. We are not robots, but we may find ourselves feeling like them.
Feminized AI voices are likely here to stay – Alexa, Siri, and all. I haven’t tried to change their voices or names on my devices, which may be an option for the technically savvy. Instead I just reflect on it, bring it up occasionally with friends, get angry about societal treatment of women, and try my best to be polite to my inhuman sisterhood.
