Future of Sex
tagline
  • Remote Sex
  • Virtual Sex & Entertainment
  • Robots
  • Human Augmentation
  • Sex Tech
  • Dating & Relationships
  • Bizarre Bazaar 18+
  • Future of Sex Community
  • Remote Sex
  • Virtual Sex & Entertainment
  • Robots
  • Human Augmentation
  • Sex Tech
  • Dating & Relationships
  • Bizarre Bazaar 18+
  • Future of Sex Community
  • Designers Unveil Wildly Creative Fashions for Pandemic Living

  • This Stroker Gives Female-like Orgasms to Trans People and Men

  • Lora DiCarlo Responds to WOW Tech Group’s ‘Pleasure Air Technology’ Patent Claims

  • Sex Tech in 2021: What Industry Leaders Expect in the Year Ahead

  • VDOM’s ‘Cyber Penis’ Evolves Wearable Sex Tech for All Genders

  • When Will Male Sex Toys Go Mainstream?

  • The ‘Virtual Girlfriend’ Experience: AI Love Doll Sends Racy Pics and Texts

  • Touching Issues: Are COVID-19 Virtual Relationships Doomed to Fail?

Future of Sex is supported by our readers. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Home > Robots > Ghosts in Our Shells: What Anime Can Teach Us about the Future of Sex

Robots
Home›Robots›Ghosts in Our Shells: What Anime Can Teach Us about the Future of Sex

Ghosts in Our Shells: What Anime Can Teach Us about the Future of Sex

By M. Christian
February 26, 2016
2923
1

Cyborgs, virtual reality, and more.

Japanese animation, anime as it is frequently called, has a long tradition of exploring humankind’s relationship with technology—including times when that relationship goes beyond intimate and into the obviously erotic.

In fact, if you look at any future speculations in anime, with regards to sexuality and technology, you’ll find not just that anime has delved into it but with a remarkably thorough and thoughtful approach.

While we know that an anime otaku (“fanboy” to use the Western meaning and not the literal Japanese translation) can more than likely come up with several others, here are just a few choice examples of anime’s future conjectures: virtual reality (.hack//SIGN), augmented reality (Dennō Coil), prosthetic limb replacement (Texhnolyze), artificial intelligence (Ergo Proxy), transgenderism (Shangri-La), robotics (Astroboy —one of the very first anime series), and many others.

But there’s one anime franchise that has touched on each of these, and done it in ways that show what could very well be the future of not just sexuality, but the very future of humanity itself.

Welcome to Ghost in the Shell

Created first as a manga (Japanese comic book) by the legendary artist/writer Masamune Shirow in 1989,Ghost in the Shell (Kōkaku Kidōtai in Japanese) became a movie in 1995, directed by Mamoru Oshii. From there the franchise has followed a long-standing Japanese tradition of re-imaginings and re-interpretations, including three animated television series, a few novels, a sequel to the first movie (Ghost in the Shell: Innocence, also by Mamoru Oshii), several other films, a few video games, and even a stage play.

Taking place in 2029 (to use the date in the original manga), the core story is that of Public Security Section 9, an elite counter-terrorist unit, headed by the main character of pretty much every incarnation of Ghost in the Shell: “Major” Motoko Kusanagi.

The Major (if the title is official or just a handle varies from series to series) is a full-body cyborg, meaning that only some of her spine and her brain is original/organic. This isn’t a rarity in this vision of the future—where partial and full-body replacement is quite common—but Kusanagi is known for being especially adept at not just operating her artificial body optimally, but also in cyber warfare, espionage, and pushing the limits of the technology envisioned by Ghost in the Shell.

“Just a whisper. I hear it in my ghost.” – The Major, Ghost in the Shell

One of the big questions Ghost In The Shell raises is “what does it actually mean to be human?” In the first movie, Kusanagi states several times that she has doubts about the nature of her existence.

For example, the opening scene in the first film shows Kusanagi’s artificial body being assembled: a quasi-erotic scene until the viewer realizes it’s about as sexual as an automobile assembly line.

In her world, a typical way of determining humanity is the presence of a “ghost” of consciousness. Humans have it, robots do not. But that doesn’t stop the Major from wondering if she, with all her artificial components, has left a key part of herself behind in the process.

“It is time to become a part of all things.” The Puppet Master, Ghost In The Shell

Despite, or because of, her doubts, the conclusion of the first film has her accepting the invitation of The Puppet Master (a form of self-aware artificial intelligence) to merge with it: to become a unique mixture of the two minds, one organic and one cybernetic.

What’s intriguing about this is how it speaks to a possible future of sexuality. The Major may look like a woman, but this is just her prosthetic “shell”’ Her real self, whatever it may be, is what she exchanges with The Puppet Master. It’s not a huge leap of speculation to see this as a natural course for digitized human consciousness and artificial intelligence: binary sex, digital merging, then reproduction into an entirely new form of life.

As the new incarnation of the Major says at the end of the first film: “And where does the newborn go from here? The net is vast and infinite.”

A shell is just a shell


Several times in Ghost in the Shell, it’s implied that gender is just a matter of external hardware. The Major’s fellow Section 9 teammate, Batou, in fact, chastises her for staying physically female when she could just as easily put her braincase into a male chassis.

Similarly, in an episode of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG, Paz, another member of the team, is stalked by a woman so obsessed she wants to physically become him by placing her brain in an artificial copy of his body. The episode is particularly chilling when, at the end, Batou and the Major share some doubts that the surviving Paz may not actually be theirs.

The speculation this brings up is fascinating: if bodies can be anything, what happens to the entire idea of gender? And why do bodies even have to be male or female? Many other characters in Ghost are what could be called a-gender or, with a few attachments when needed, multi-gender. Once we move beyond organic bodies what will happen to sex? Ghost may not have the answer but the franchise does pose some interesting questions.

A solid state society

It’s questions like this that make Ghost such an interesting anime franchise. Another way it looks at the future of humankind, and of course sex, is raised in the film (tied into the Stand Alone Complex series): Solid State Society.

Without going into too much of the story, which deals with collective consciousness, the vanishing mediator, and more heady stuff, there is a moment where the Major, after stepping away from Section 9, has set up shop for herself as an investigator. In her office/workspace, she has several artificial bodies that she can operate independently. In fact, a key point of the story is that one of these split-off selves acts a bit too independently.

When we are able to convert our minds, our ghosts, into digital versions why shouldn’t we be able to do what the Major was able to — if not more? After all, a program can be run on more than one platform at a time. Separated digital minds could be later synced together, merging the two versions into a combined whole again.

Is this sex? If not—why not? It could almost be seen as a form of complex masturbation: making love to Your own mind, or a version of it.

Bodies, again, could be used for whatever explorations a person wants to enjoy. You could take your male body out on a date with yourself in a female body, or any combination of gender, or even a new one, you may desire. The net, indeed, would be extremely vast and absolutely infinite.

“If a technological feat is possible, man will do it.” – The Major, Ghost in the Shell


Ghost in the Shell is a remarkable franchise, delving as it does into humanity, physical identity, and artificial consciousness.

And there’s sex. Even its very first appearance, in Masamune Shirow’s manga, there was a rather notorious explicit sex scene in virtual reality with the Major. But while there is certainly eroticism in every incarnation of the Major’s adventures, there’s also at its heart a penetrating examination of where we all might be heading.

Again, Ghost in the Shell may not have all the answers, but the questions it raises are ones we all will have to face, learn from and use to grow as human—whatever that may be.

Or, as the Puppet Master puts it: “All things change in a dynamic environment. Your effort to remain what you are is what limits you.”

Image sources: Amazon, Juki0HK0

M. Christian

M.Christian loves nothing better than exploring the intersections of sex and technology—and speculating on the future of both. A highly regarded erotica writer he has six novels,12 collections,100+ short stories, and 25 anthologies as an editor to his name. His non-fiction regularly appears n many sites, but he’s most proud of being a regular contributor to Future of Sex.

Of his erotic fiction, Tristan Taormino said that “M.Christian is a literary stylist of the highest caliber: smart, funny, frightening, sexy—there's nothing he can't write about … and brilliantly.”

Reflecting his unique ability to sympathetically and convincingly write for a range of genders and sexual orientations, his stories have appeared in multiple editions of Best American Erotica, Best Gay Erotica, Best Lesbian Erotica, The Mammoth Books of Erotica, and others. His collection of gay erotic fiction, Dirty Words, was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award.

While a majority of his stories have been collected into books like Dirty Words, his fondness for combining sex and science fiction is clearly evident in collections that include Rude Mechanicals, Technorotica, Better Than The Real Thing, Skin Effect Effect, Bachelor Machine, and Hard Drive: The Best Sci-Fi Erotica of M.Christian.

As a novelist, M.Christian’s versatility is on full display with and the somewhat controversial queer BDSM/horror/thrillers Finger's Breadth, and Me2.

M.Christian has worked on the industry’s production side as an Associate Publisher for Renaissance E Books and as a Publisher for Digital Parchment Services. The latter dedicated to celebrating the works of science-fiction legends such as William Rotsler, Jerome Bixby, Jody Scott, Arthur Byron Cover, Ernest Hogan, and James Van Hise.

Covering topics like BDSM safety, sexual education, senior sexuality concerns, queer and gender issues, plus reviewing a variety of sextech products, M.Christian’s non-fiction has appeared on sites like Kinkly, Tickle.Life, Sexpert, Queer Majority, Sex for Every Body, and—of course—his ongoing work for Future of Sex.

If there’s anything M.Christian enjoys more than writing, it’s teaching. A featured presenter, sometimes with his friend Ralph Greco Jr, at national sex and BDSM events, he’s lectured on kink play (with an emphasis on safety), polyamory, boosting sexual creativity, and erotica writing--for beginners or those wanting to go pro.

M.Christian is a cohost on two popular sex-education podcasts: Love’s Outer Limits with Dr. Amy Marsh and Licking Non-Vanilla with Ralph Greco, Jr.

M.Christian's Books (Sizzler Editions)
M.Christian's Audiobooks
Previous Article

Say Goodbye to the Mod: Patent Suit ...

Next Article

Sex Tech and the Japanese Sex Crisis

Related articles More from author

  • Robots

    ‘Love and Sex with Robots’ Conference Re-launches After Malaysian Ban

    October 20, 2016
    By Jenna Owsianik, Editor-in-Chief of FutureofSex.net
  • AugmentationImmersive EntertainmentRemote SexRobotsSex TechVirtual SexVirtual Sex & Entertainment

    Infographic: The Future of Sex

    November 17, 2016
    By Future of Sex
  • Robots

    Here’s Henry, the Hunky Male Sex Robot You’ve Been Waiting For

    February 28, 2018
    By Jenna Owsianik, Editor-in-Chief of FutureofSex.net
  • Robots

    Would You Buy a Lara Croft Sex Robot? It May One Day Be Possible

    November 4, 2016
    By M. Christian
  • Robots

    Love 2.0: Software Agents and Sexuality

    July 20, 2016
    By M. Christian
  • AugmentationImmersive EntertainmentRemote SexRobotsVirtual Sex & Entertainment

    Power Exchange: The Future of BDSM Sex

    July 29, 2016
    By M. Christian

  • Nutaku Welcome
    Virtual Sex & Entertainment

    Nutaku Welcomes Adult Film Superstar Asa Akira Into Booty Calls Game

  • NAO robot writing
    Robots

    Robot Sex Writers: Computer-Generated Erotica Is Becoming Popular

  • The Feel Connect app joins remote sex devices together for long-distance sexual fun.
    Remote Sex

    Feel Connect App: Getting Started with the Interactive Sex Toy App

  • TOP REVIEWS

  • Realistic Sex Games

    Review of the Best Most Realistic Sex Games You Can Play [UPDATED]

    0
  • Multiplayer Online Sex Games

    Review of the Best Massively Multiplayer Online Sex Games

    0
  • Sex Games for Mac

    The Best Sex Games for Mac

    0
  • Best Sex Game Apps for Couples

    The Best Sex Game Apps for Couples for 2020 [Updated]

    0
  • The Best RPG Sex Games of 2020

    0

Like Us on Facebook

Latest Tweets

  • "Last year showed how important it is to maintain health and emotional balance and it couldn't be a better time to… https://t.co/9lAnFDeCMl

    5 hours ago
  • Wildly creative designers unveil unique and outlandish fashions made to keep you safe while still getting your haut… https://t.co/J6MHqmrhF7

    11 hours ago
  • The new Ion stroker from @Arcwaveofficial excites pleasure receptors in the frenulum to give the sensation of femal… https://t.co/r6DjPo3Flr

    15 hours ago
  • In a press statement, @LoraDiCarlo_HQ denies claims of patent infringement, alleging the aim of WOW Tech Group's la… https://t.co/9en8yormEy

    Jan 16, 2021
  • Expert insights on #sextech in 2021: *Jeff Bennett/@MedicalMorari *Dema Tio/@Vibease *Angelina Aleksandrovich/… https://t.co/xK2Sm1VY1u

    Jan 15, 2021
Follow @futureofsex

Follow us

  • Home
  • About
  • ADVERTISE
  • Contribute
  • Story Ideas?
  • Sitemap
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms and Conditions
© 2011 - 2020 Future Exploration Network
This website or its third-party tools use cookies to improve user experience and track affiliate sales. To learn more about why we need to use cookies, please refer to the Privacy Policy.

By clicking the agree button or continuing to browse through the website, you agree to the use of cookies. Accept Privacy Policy
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled

Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.

Non-necessary