This is a genuinely intolerable reality…

This is basically what just happened to Lily Allen’s ex!

Hahah this teaches me for not looking properly into things. Sometimes people say they have “discovered” areas of research and I get how that can upset people (it upsets me!), so I wanted to clarify that is not what I was doing. Now off the internet and to read about hype studies!

I’m reading this as playful shade and I don’t mind it, but there truly was nothing (not 1 paper) written on break-ups on the discipline my PhD is on (analytic philosophy, where there is also tons of work on implicature!)

I remain neutral about other uses of chatbots in break-ups, but these have to be looked at too. The paper is part of a SI on Grief in the Digital Age, so I wanted to raise wider questions about the role of continuing bonds in grief, which has often been seen as positive (including by me) /&6

All of this tells us that when used to build continuing bonds, break-up bots are oppressive by design: they are made to foster each of these harms. This is all taking the best scenario where the ex consents to it! So this kind of tech should be regulated before it becomes widespread/ 5

Third, by engaging w break-up chatbots users capitulate to oppressive master narratives about romantic life (like ‘amatonormativity’, according to which a fulfilling life can only be had in a romantic relationship). They then enter an oppressive narrative niche that they themselves help building/4

Second, bc interaction w bots is built exclusively on the user's terms, it fosters self-serving relationships and power imbalances, even depriving the ex-partner of an unrelinquishable normative power. Precisely what feminist philosophers warn about romantic life/3

First, they put users in an imaginary relationship. Here I make an analogy with Tom Hanks's relationship with Wilson (drawing from Norlock's original example). Unlike Tom&Wilson, the relationship w the bot is grounded on misdirected love, so bots keep the user engaged in a meaningless project/2

Thank you! I will read your chapter and intro; this is incredibly helpful

3) there is a tendency to stick the labels to specific contexts or applied settings where 'knowledge' is involved without much thought going into what the notion of epistemic injustice (or sub-categories) are picking up. Does that make sense?

Oh yes sure, I think there could be three problems (which I don't necessarily endorse): 1) so many subcategories have diluted the explanatory power of 'epistemic injustice', 2) there is a 'category race' which expands the terminology without necessarily deepening the understanding of EI