this post was submitted on 14 Dec 2023
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Normally I'm very much anti "lets use robots to replace jobs", but this is one case where I think it would be a win for everybody. The robot won't care, and the elderly person won't feel their dignity lost, and all is taken care of behind closed doors.
My grandma started losing control of herself towards the end, and my mother did overtime in taking care of her and cleaning her. This sounds sweet, but it was a bad situation for everyone. My mother essentially started treating her own mother like a baby, often in front of us, and my grandmother (a proud and strong woman my entire life) essentially lost her sense of dignity and independence. I still remember her as the strong and proud woman she was, and I do my best to forget her last year.
We need robot caretakers.
The only problem is that robots don't have the kind of sense of connection and humanity that human caretakers often have, on top of the general complexity of the task. I was always frustrated when family would visit and treat their aunt/cousin/etc like a baby when like, no, they're 80 years old and were raised on a farm. It's really just a matter of needing appropriately trained caretaking staff who are also paid enough, which sadly the industry lacks both of those things