Welcome to Issue No. 04 – THE FUTURISTS
The future is something we’ve always imagined. An unknown. A promise. A threat. A projection. Is the future you once imagined now your reality? Is your current reality shaping the future to come?
Words: Lila Theodoros
FEATURING:
Kate Kennedy: Makes Them Pay
The future is in our hands: Modern Palmistry
A future with or without children
Red Lights & Robots: The Future of Sex
Of Flesh and Fiction: a VR love story
The future I want: a manifesto
And more!
Moi is our printed magazine featuring 96 pages of sensory pleasure – hold us close, caress our pages, treasure us dearly and feel the love poured into every feature by our passionate contributors. From the absolute bottom of my heart, welcome to our world of Pleasure – *Moi*.
Editor’s Letter:
I was a heteronormative femme bot, programmed by the patriarchy to serve, reproduce and submit. The Program was there with me, received via not-so-subtly coded messages from childhood: Be the damsel in distress; Find your prince; Get married; and Be happy, forever after. There was of course, strong interference being run, messages coming from deep within, an older program, an ancient program that felt more rewarding and authentically me: I don’t want to get married, ever; I don’t know what I want yet, but I don’t think it’s this; I don’t want children, and that’s ok. But the Program would then run the Patriarchal Propaganda sequence: “A successful life is marriage, a house and children.”“Being sad in a marriage is not as bad as being alone.”“Be a good wife and hold your tongue.” For years, I lived inside the Program, looking at other femme bots, at the careers they had paused to reproduce, at the thinly veiled jokes made about husbands being useless, how tired (sad/angry) they were, but all still seemingly happy to continue in that same loop, forever. And suddenly I was 40, the loop viscously ripped open, the marriage (programmed contract) ended, and I was free.
It’s been almost five years, and I have learned to live a life that I actually want – one of autonomy, choice, pleasure, independence and self-love. I embrace that ancient intuition and listen to my own desires, not to the Patriarchal Propaganda. But, breaking the Program is a constant effort. I was born and raised in a world deeply (generationally) coded to play to the script. My role was to execute my program without resistance. It’s like a reflex or muscle reaction, embedded deep inside: “You should be ashamed for not wanting the same as the rest of us!” So every day I reset, rewire and recalibrate to dismantle the Program. I am not a femme bot. I am a woman with agency who chooses to live a life of my own creation.
In this issue, we explore the future of intimacy, pleasure and choice. We examine how AI is being utilised to role-play emotional intimacy. A Future With or Without Children details an artistic project that investigates how reproductive choice is produced, constrained and imagined. We look at how technology has liberated women from acceptance of the bare minimum as we demand the centering of the female orgasm. Enjoy psilocybin-fuelled orgy erotica, VR avatars finding love, a sugar baby building a community with a podcast, ancient palmistry used for future insight, sex robot brothels and so much more.
We are breaking free from the Program and building a future that is ours to design. What lies before us is possibility and, finally, choice. The future I imagine is one that we create for ourselves. Fuck the patriarchal program. Find your pleasure and create a future that makes you happy.
Lila Theodoros
Publisher & Managing Editor
