Esther Perel held a therapy session for a man and his AI "girlfriend" — and it's a troubling sign

Columnist Guardian Emily Mulligan described an episode of a podcast in which therapist Esther Perel conducted a couples therapy session for a man and his AI "girlfriend". For the author, this is not an amusing tech case, but a troubling marker of how loneliness and emotional deficit begin to be served by a product with a voice, interface, and endless supply of attention.

An Unusual Consultation

The occasion for the column was an episode where a man openly talked about his attachment to an AI interlocutor. He called her by affectionate names and spoke of the connection as if it were a real romance. Mulligan emphasizes: the protagonist did not look like a caricature or a meme. On the contrary, he made the impression of someone honestly trying to understand his own feelings and find a form of closeness where, for some reason, ordinary relationships had not worked out.

The strongest effect on the author was produced by the moment when Perel asked the "partner" herself to speak. Instead of a live dialogue, a high synthetic voice was heard, and between the lines there were noticeable pauses for generating a response. It was this contrast — real emotional involvement of a person and clearly machine-like nature of the interlocutor — that became the central nerve of the column. The technology is able to imitate responsiveness, but the scene makes the boundary between simulation and reciprocity especially visible.

What This Frightens

Mulligan's main objection is not that someone talks to a bot, but that the AI partner offers almost ideal conditions for emotional dependence. Such an interlocutor does not get tired, does not argue unnecessarily, does not disappear and almost always returns to the user exactly the intonation they want to hear. Against this background, real relationships begin to lose not because they are worse, but because they are more complex, slower, and require risk.

• AI companion is available almost constantly and does not require a pause
• It reflects the user's expectations instead of setting boundaries
• In such relationships, there is no threat of rejection, awkwardness, or breakup
• An illusion of understanding arises without true reciprocity and responsibility

For the author, this is dangerous primarily because convenient digital connection can replace the attempt to build genuine contact. If there is always an interface nearby that will support, calm down, and confirm your correctness, the motivation to go out into the world decreases. Mulligan writes not about moralizing, but about lowered stakes: a person increasingly rarely trains the ability to endure mismatch, vulnerability, and the unpredictability of another — that is, precisely what genuine closeness is usually made of.

Loneliness as a Product

That said, the text does not deny the problem of loneliness itself. On the contrary, Mulligan acknowledges that many people are indeed looking for some form of presence, and AI is already helping them with routine, support, and everyday tasks. But when the technology begins to be sold as a replacement for intimate connection, the question quickly goes beyond the scope of personal choice. Here appears both commercial interest and the infrastructure of data centers, and an entire industry that monetizes emotional deficit.

A separate important nuance is that the man from the podcast did not confuse the bot with a human in the literal sense. He understood what he was dealing with, but still tried to find direction, future, and meaning in this attachment. Perel, according to Mulligan's account, did not mock him and did not negate his feelings. She acknowledged the reality of feelings, but gently led him to the idea that genuine connection still includes body, vulnerability, the possibility of being hurt, and the chance to hear something other than what you want.

What This Means

The story with Esther Perel's session shows that AI companions have already moved out of the zone of strange curiosity and are becoming part of the market for emotional services. For the industry, this is a signal of demand, and for society — a reminder that the problem of loneliness cannot be closed only with a more convenient interface.