Isaac Leung / Lingnan University

On Friday Isaac Leung from the Lingnan University Department of Cultural Studies in Hong Kong flew to the states, arrived in San Francisco, rode BART to the El Cerrito Plaza Station and took a cab to my office in El Sobrante. He's working on his thesis. Somehow I figured into his project with the publication of "Sex Machines : Photographs and Interviews" that came out in 2006. It seemed like he had recieved some sort of funding for this research.

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Before he booked the flight I got nervous and wrote him a note: Look, I need to be frank with you before you spend all of this time and energy coming out here. I'm simply this suburban-Dad type of guy who did this project on a subculture. I'm not part of any sexual scene out here. I have no machines. I'm a photographer and this is simply a project I did.

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He seemed to understand and here he is, at my front door, smiling and gracious as he pays the turban-wearing cab driver and unloads his camera and gear into my house. His thesis? The title is "Queering Sex Machines: The Cultural Formation of Non-Normative Sexualities and Contemporary Technosexual Practices. "

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As an interviewer, he's a pro and had done his homework. His questions were spot-on and made me think; he seemed to know all the characters in the book. With some apology, he asked the following question that really was a keeper. My only hope is that I remembered it correctly:

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IL: So with the technological advances that are being made concerning the future of sex robots, are you optimistic about the future?

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TA: The future of what?

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IL: Optimistic about the future of our civilization. Do you feel that humans will continue to have sex with each other even when faced with a potentially perfect sex robot?

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TA: Oh, I dunno. Do I really need to answer that?