Today’s question no one’s asked: What’s with all the robots?

If I illustrate anything, it’s usually with some kind robot thing out of a Midjourney prompt, for two reasons:

  1. We as humans are just big dumb machines, with amazing brains that do dumb things and we in turn do dumb things thanks to those brains.
  2. As an autistic person, there’s a daily conflict between Robot Boy and Real Boy, in that Robot Boy is going to give you just straight analysis without considering your feelings, and Real Boy is going to try and activate that module where he thinks about how you might receive the message.

Oh, and I’m pretty sure robots are going to take on most labor in the next several years, so there is that. 

That 2nd point above doesn’t mean those of us on the spectrum aren’t empathetic: quite the opposite. I won’t speak for my people, because it is a spectrum, but I know I spend most of my days with lowkey anxiety as a subtext, worried that I’m going to get the response wrong, and I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.

Also, decades of masking mean that I’m pretty damn good at reading how someone’s receiving me, and there has never been a time when my anxiety gave me a false read: I know when you’re not into me, because living in a daily state of isolation from neurotypicals, I’m keenly aware of my efforts to try and connect. 

And no, they’re not a special interest, but they’re a machine and as an autistic person, I do like me some machines.

So that’s why the robots.