Alexa/Siri et al aren’t about “consumerism” — that’s the naïve interpretation— that’s just a surface look. These devices represent the future of how man interacts with machine. Right now, they are mostly toys used for “consumer” purposes, but look at the internet itself — during the early days one could have asked “why should we be building networks for the military? Dismissing Alexa/etc. as mere vehicles for consumption is missing the greater possibilities. This tech has to start (and be financed) somewhere: thus Amazon using this as a tool to buy things is fine — because it ultimately will push the future forward despite your worries about slave labor. If we stopped buying everything tomorrow, there would still be slave labor and bad things in the world as there always has been. People need to eat, clothe themselves and make shelters. Stopping weapon production doesn’t end wars nor would stopping AI personal assistants reduce some poorer people working for some less poor people to fill an economic need. That’s reality.