"In these modern times, every home in Cairo should enjoy the convenience of a boilerplate eunuch." His arms gesture about the room, where faceless metal automatons shaped in the likeness of men stand motionless, reminiscent of soldiers awaiting inspection--or corpses arrayed in their tomb.

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The juxtaposition of the mender's words, amiable and speaking of convenience, speaking about these metal and clockwork similes of people to be used as commonplace household servants is so interesting combined with the further descriptions of them. They're already said to somewhat resemble humans, which is itself a little disconcerting, but when humanizing them a bit more by calling them soldiers or corpses, it causes more discomfort, both because of having the comparison at all, and because of these two specific comparisons. In both instances, much or all autonomy is taken away from people. Soldiers are trained to listen, act, obey. Thinking is looked down on, even treasonous. Picturing them standing awaiting inspection, standing all in a row, made as similar as possible, dehumanizes them and pushes them closer to being automatons. Deviations from the standard, the expectations, are punished.

The blending of human and machine in these boilerplate eunuchs and in this quote seem to conflict or contrast with each other. How could we not see the automatons as being closer to people, when it's human nature to find humanistic qualities in "the other," like we do with animals? The fact that animals have personalities and feelings and communities and even funerals without us needing to attribute them doesn't negate our empathy. Metal doesn't have feelings. Gears don't. But putting them all together in a shape similar to our own, giving them faces similar to our own, infusing them with something in this world of magic that makes it possible for them to interact with us--how is it possible for us to interact with them and not see something more than a moving configuration of metal and metallic parts? I find it interesting how dismissive this merchant/mender seems to be of them as entities while extolling their usefulness as tools, also while the author lays out comparisons that make us feel they may be something more.

this is so hard to read if youre not a native english speaker, its full of rare words and even of foreign and archaic ones 🥲 its so frustrating and humbling