>This riles the hell out of your stereotypical ultra-lefty
>Robots Are People protest marcher, because he doesn't see why they do
>it. To him, the thing for a robot to do after receiving that
>certification and being declared a free citizen is move to Oregon and
>do anything other than that he/she/it was built for - take up
>painting, grow weed, follow the Spuzchuckers on their eternal tour,
>whatever. To him, the fact that so many free robots stay right where
>they already were is prima facie evidence that the process is a
>sham, cheap theater to placate people like him, and that robots are
>still slaves.

They also overlook the fact that a certified robot can't be summarily scrapped or memwiped, since that would be murder.

>
>The simple fact of the matter is that, in all but a few exceptional
>cases, robots like to do what they were built to do. Even the
>most sophisticated robots - especially the most sophisticated
>robots - are engineered to enjoy doing their jobs. If they
>weren't, they wouldn't do a good job. Besides, the downside of
>emancipation is that you have to earn a living, and patchouli oil is a
>lousy substitute for Grade C67 lube oil. The hippie lifestyle doesn't
>keep the cockroach in Twinkies, as it were.

And there are few things sadder than a robot that cannot fulfill its design purpose. I recently read Saturn's Children by Charles Stross which is about a sexbot 200 years after the extinction of humanity. It opens with her preparing to commit suicide.

Polychrome