Ohio Lawmaker Wants to Ban Marriage Between Humans and AI Chatbots

Marriage equality is once again a topic of conversation in the Ohio legislature, although—this time—the debate isn’t about the marriage between two humans but, instead, between humans and software.

Yes, a recently introduced bill in the Buckeye state would ban legal marriages between AI programs and their human users. In case you didn’t know this was a thing, it is—and, increasingly, it seems to be something that people are interested in doing. A number of recent articles have shed light on the growing trend in which people are apparently saying “I do” to their romantic partner chatbots. Some AI lovers still have human partners but apparently feel deeper connections to the chatbots in their lives.

Well, one Ohio lawmaker wants to put a stop to it. NBC-4 in Ohio writes that Rep. Thaddeus Claggett, who chairs the state’s House Technology and Innovation Committee, has introduced legislation that would stop such unions from occurring. Indeed, not only would House Bill 469 stop the wedding bells for AI-human relationships, it would also stop AI programs from gaining the status of legal personhood. The bill states:

No AI system shall be recognized as a spouse, domestic partner, or hold any personal legal status analogous to marriage or union with a human or another AI system. Any purported attempt to marry or create a personal union with an AI system is void and has no legal effect.

Claggett’s interest in banning AI-human unions would appear to have a lot more to do with maintaining exclusive legal rights for humans than it does with stopping people from getting so emotionally attached to their software programs that they decide to tie the knot with them. NBC-4 notes that the goal is to stop AI programs from being able to take on roles that the act of marriage confers upon them—stuff like holding power of attorney or making financial decisions.

“As the computer systems improve in their capacity to act more like humans, we want to be sure we have prohibitions in our law that prohibit those systems from ever being human in their agency,” Claggett told the news outlet. “People need to understand, we’re not talking about marching down the aisle to some tune and having a ceremony with the robot that’ll be on our streets here in a year or two,” he added. “That could happen, but that’s not really what we’re saying.”

It’s unclear what sort of support the legislation has with the rest of the state’s lawmakers, although we may know soon enough. The bill, which was introduced by Claggett in September, is currently being discussed in the state’s House committee.