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Robot Camel Jockeys



The people of Qatar and other Middle Eastern countries love their camel racing. And really, who can blame them? Big stinky weird animals running around in the sand. What’s not to love? Child slavery! That’s what!

Seems that up until recently, children were used as jockeys for the camel racing, because of their light weight. But the country has been subjected to international pressure due to the harsh almost slave-labor conditions these children worked in. Using children has since been outlawed. But somebody had to replace them, because the nobel tradition of camel racing couldn’t just die out. So they invented these weird little robotic jockeys to ride the camels instead. The BBC reports:

“The mechanical jockey is light in weight and receives orders from the instructor via a remote control system fixed on the back of the camel,” the daily Gulf News said, quoting an official statement.

If you feel at all weird about this, wait till you actually see these little guys in action. It’s so weird looking that it’s rather hard to explain.

Don’t they look like little robotic cops? Why don’t we put together an army of these little mechanical weirdos to fight for us in the Middle East? You know what the weirdest part of all this is though? I actually had a dream that I was riding a camel a couple weeks ago. I remember it vividly. I’ve never done so in real life though (un)fortunately.

[Found via Robotic Nation Evidence]







9 Reader Responses

  1. Quoter Says:
    August 2nd, 2005 at 10:22 pm

    According to the silly site Dream Moods, “To see a camel in your dream, denotes that you need to be more conservative; you are carrying too many problems on your shoulders. You tend to hold on and cling on to your emotions instead of expressing and releasing them. You need to learn to forgive and forget. Alternatively, it represents you potential for handling big problems, responsibilities, and burdens.”

  2. carlos Says:
    August 2nd, 2005 at 11:33 pm

    what’s not to love? camel slavery. hey, i’m sure a camel loves a good race as much as the next mammal, but do we really have to strap robots to their backs?

    i think these robots are worse than using the kids. sure the whole slavery thing wasn’t ideal but note the archonic solution. ban children from racing camels!?! why not pass a law to improve how children are treated? no no no, let them be just as poor and mistreated doing something else far less exciting than racing camels.

    and again with the robots. i used to love the idea of robots but all our robots are wack wack wack, and these look kinda creepy like those lifesize dolls at neverland ranch.

    but what really bugs me is that those are our camels, we domesticated them, they are ours, and if we treat them right, they’re our friends too. robots are already taking our jobs. if we let robots ride our beasts of burden, it’s only a matter of time before we come home to find robots fucking our girlfriends.

    hey robots, get your own fucking planet!

    (wow! i’ve just discovered that i’m racist against robots)

  3. Dan Says:
    August 3rd, 2005 at 1:10 am

    I have a good feeling about this carlos guy.

  4. Occult Investigator Says:
    August 3rd, 2005 at 10:38 am

    Carlos, I can’t remember where it was but I just recently read something elsewhere about a dude coming home to find his robot laying his girlfriend.

  5. J. Puma Says:
    August 3rd, 2005 at 11:49 am

    ‘racist against robots’– perfect!

    that should be on a t-shirt. i bet you’d sell a ton of ‘em. i’d buy one.

  6. Occult Investigator Says:
    August 3rd, 2005 at 11:52 am

    Also an awesome idea for a comic book: a sort of KKK type secret group who’s always trying to kick the robots out of the community!

  7. Kylark Says:
    August 3rd, 2005 at 1:12 pm

    Do you guys watch Futurama? There’s a lot of jokes in there about racism against robots. Of course, the main character’s best friend is a robot.

    It’s by Matt Groening, and I think it’s even funnier than the Simpsons, if subtler and more quirky, and it’s definitely better animated. All four seasons are on DVD; check it out.

    (My apologies if I over-elaborated something that’s kinda obvious, but sometimes I’m surprised that more people aren’t familiar with this show.)

  8. J. Puma Says:
    August 3rd, 2005 at 1:22 pm

    oh HELL yeah i LOVE futurama. i agree– it’s way funnier & smarter than anything from the last six seasons of the simpsons. i could deal with having a society of benders around.

    “Fry, I’m sorry. I should have understood how someone can love an inferior creature… because I love you… not in the way of the ancient Greeks, but the way a robot loves a human, and a human loves a dog, and, occasionally, a gorilla loves a kitty.”

    “You know the secret of traditional robot cooking? Start with a good
    high-quality oil, then eat it.”

  9. alistair Says:
    August 5th, 2005 at 3:19 pm

    robots are one thing, it`s those fucking cyborgs i worry about.



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