Dystopian Panic, Transphobic Hatred, and Annihilation Anxiety: Critiquing Radical Feminist Opposition to Sex Robots

In this thesis, I critically analyze radical feminist opposition to the development, sale, and use of sex robots, focusing on the Campaign Against Sex Robots and its affiliated scholars and activists. Drawing from theoretical frameworks including sex-positive feminism, queer theory, and posthumanism, I use a feminist critical discourse analysis to examine the ideological assumptions that underpin feminist anti-sex robot arguments. This thesis traces two interrelated themes: how 'real' womanhood is discursively defined and defended by anti-sex robot feminists through the violent exclusion of certain bodies, and how these feminists mobilize discourses of love, intimacy, and relationships to bolster normative heterosexual relationality. Ultimately, I argue that while anti-sex robot feminists claim to oppose systemic violence, their arguments reveal a deep investment in violence, particularly against trans women, in the name of protecting a narrowly defined ideal of womanhood and intimacy.