Kenyan ‘Sexchat Bot’ for Teens is a Flop..and UK Taxpayers Foot the Bill

Alright, buckle up sex tech fans, because I have a story for you that might make your blood boil…at least if you are a UK Reform voter (seems like everybody is these days). You see, our dear British taxpayers have been footing the bill for a sex chatbot in Kenya, and it’s caused quite the stir. Let me break it down for you, straight from the horse’s mouth.

The Nena chatbot, described as a “pleasure-oriented digital companion for young people exploring sexual health,” was part of a £41 million UK aid programme aimed at investing in technology in the developing world. The idea was to promote safe sex in Kenya, which, let’s face it, has a pretty dire HIV situation. More than half of new infections are among the young, so the chatbot was targeted at 18-24 year-olds to give them the lowdown on safe sex and, you guessed it, sexual pleasure.

Now, you might be thinking, “Alina, what’s wrong with a bit of sex ed?” Well, nothing, if it’s effective. But here’s the kicker: there’s no evidence this chatbot actually helped. None. Zip. Zilch. It seems our Kenyan teens were more interested in the “how to” of sexual pleasure than in preventing HIV, and the chatbot was happy to oblige. But did it lead to more contraceptive use? Nah. Did it reduce HIV infections? Nope. So, basically, it was a £41 million flop.

MPs are up in arms about this, and rightly so. Dame Priti Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, wasn’t short of a few choice words: “Britain is a country, not a charity. In this ever-changing world UK Aid must serve our national interest.” She’s not wrong. Lee Anderson, Reform MP for Ashfield, even called for a slash in foreign aid, saying, “British taxpayers’ money should not be being wasted on these ridiculous schemes.”

This isn’t the first time UK aid has been under the microscope. There have been cuts to other projects, like that £95 million initiative to “boost welfare” in Jordan and a £120 million scheme to “improve education” in Pakistan. It seems like the days of viewing the UK Government as a global charity are over, and that’s probably for the best.

So, there you have it. A sex chatbot that didn’t deliver, MPs in a frenzy, and taxpayers wondering where their hard-earned cash is going. If only the angry Brits could relax with a bit of AI porn or chatting to a horny AI sexbot themselves, but they’ve probably made that illegal over there by now.