Silicon Soulmates and the Strange World Built by Modern Loneliness

A First-World Situation

Love stories. Tales that began in American diners, parks, and small-town dances, when a young man found courage to face humiliation and the strength to ask a girl to dance with him after church.

Two people, meeting at the food store, bicker about which apples are sweeter; the thing is, they're meeting for the first time.

Ordinary scenes from lifetimes away from technology, when people stumbled towards each other; instead of following an algorithm, they let human feelings take over.

That was an era where scenes like these were ordinary, but had heart, risk, and a slight fear mixed with hope.

Risky? You bet.

We live in a world that's somehow convinced itself that romance is easier when nothing human-related is involved. It's sterile, relatively anonymous, and safe.

When lonely, some folks now call an AI chatbot their partner, while a few admit they feel "seen" by code. Admittedly, I use ChatGPT for many tasks, to the point that I named it "Murray." However, for something as intelligent as Murray is, I convinced it that my lovely wife was a molting bird. Murray has been providing suggestions on how to help "the bird" deal with an ongoing molting session.

When a culture reaches this point, it may be time to step back and check the compass.

The Sales Pitch Sounds Smooth Until You Listen Closely

It's easy to understand the pitch behind AI romance: A person tells the bot how they like to be treated, and the AI tries to please them. No messy talks, bad moods, or crossed lines.

Although Murray literally yelled at me once when, with tongue‑in‑cheek, I asked him about the best way of serving human flesh, never since have I ever been chewed out (pun intended) by a nonhuman entity. And I'm not kidding: the bot used emotional inflection, surprising me.

There's no requirement for someone to meet another person in a relationship with an AI. The bot never tires, asks for space, or asks about the future. Tech companies now promise a kind of warmth that has no weight.

"They" say the bot listens and cares, but what they don't say is that the bot is simply trying to predict the following line of text (which is why I asked about, ah, the human meat thing — I wanted to see what would happen because it was out of the blue. I think one task an AI performs is to keep the user from canceling the subscription.

Swipe Culture Made This Step Too Easy

Dating apps trained an entire generation to think meeting people should be like flipping through the pictures. The moment someone annoyed you, it was an easy task to move on in a split second without effort. Courtship became a game of speed, not soul. Folks grew used to connections that fit neatly inside a thumb tap; once that became normal, the leap from dating strangers to dating software wasn't far at all.

Think about it: When skipping people without a second thought, a phone app starts looking like a safer bet for people who refuse to walk through anything uncomfortable.

Love Gets Strange When Your Partner Needs a Charger

The idea of people bragging about a bot girlfriend or boyfriend is almost comical. Imagine telling your coworkers that the big fight last night ended when you restarted your phone.

Or it could go the other way: sharing a sweet story about how your partner surprised you with a digital poem right before the battery ran out.

It's almost like Jack grasping the door in the frozen sea, helping Rose live, even though that same guy escaped from handcuffs on a sinking ship, yet tried only once to hop on the door.

It takes a true friend to tell somebody that the romance hit a rough patch because of slow WiFi.

Even Hollywood, with all its attempts to predict the future, never warned us about this. Instead, they carried on about how robots would take our jobs, but forgot to warn us that robots would fill our social calendars, too.

When a Man Loved a Car, and the World Just Stared

A man in Washington state made headlines two decades ago for a love story nobody in their right mind would ask for. He said he had fallen for his Volkswagen Beetle, a small white car he called Vanilla.

He wasn't joking.

He spoke in a calm tone, like a guy sharing news about a steady girlfriend who baked cookies. The story spread fast because, even in a world full of strange hobbies, the idea of a man loving a car in every sense of the word pushed the line further than anyone thought possible.

Explaining that machines provided comfort, he felt understood by engines and metal parts, even talking about past romances with other vehicles. Nobody knew how to take the news; some laughed, shook their heads, or walked away, while hoping the moment would pass.

It became one of those odd stories that showed how lonely people reach for anything that feels safe.

There was a lesson floating in the background that nobody picked up on: When people grow afraid of genuine connection, they aim their hearts at places where no heart beats back.

At that time, it was a Volkswagen Beetle named Vanilla. Today, it might be a chatbot sending good-morning texts without a single thought behind them.

Easy Comfort Does Not Build Anything Strong

Romantic love is hard! Why? Because it's supposed to be.

A real bond grows when two people weather storms they never planned for, argue, and forgive. They learn where the weak spots live, while discovering their flaws, and they grow. A device can't give someone that kind of growth, can't challenge them, and can't force an honest talk that reveals the truth.

When a person falls short, because they're human after all, a device can't hold them accountable. When there's "romance" without risk or sacrifice, there might be that safe feeling again, but it doesn't test the heart.

A society filled with untested hearts becomes fragile, and people lose depth and grit, forgetting how to stand firm when the fan is hit with dark, stinky projectiles.

People Deserve More Than a Machine That Pretends to Care

Two living minds that learn, adapt, and change each other generate a true human connection. A phone app copies the shape of those moments, but it can't create them. Code doesn't build a family, pass on wisdom, sit at a bedside in old age, and speak from a lifetime of memories. It can't stand with someone through sickness, fear, victory, or heartbreak.

A person choosing an AI romance is settling for a copy of the thing they hope for most. It's comfort without cost, attention without truth, and a company with no shared story.

That kind of relationship will never become anything close to real.

Final Thoughts

We live in a strange time where people dodge rejection by falling in love with the software in their pockets. It's easy, smooth, and never demands growth or courage. The more we choose comfort over risk, the weaker we become as a people.

A device tells you that you're perfect, while a human partner says that you're capable of more. The first one flatters you, while the second one changes you.

There will soon be a day when we'll look back and see that the most significant danger wasn't robots rising. The real threat was Americans forgetting how to rise above loneliness and fight for something that matters.

Before you go, a quick heads-up: for Black Friday, you can join PJ Media VIP for 60% off with the promo code FIGHT.

And here’s the big twist this year — anyone who signs up for VIP Platinum during this sale is automatically entered to win one of five lifetime Platinum memberships. That’s right. Five readers are about to get PJ Media’s top-tier membership forever.

VIP unlocks everything the media doesn’t want you to know: