RUR Power Quotes

Domin condescends to Helena compulsively; he never tells her anything. This is a way to protect her and to keep power over her. But in asserting power, Domin ultimately loses it. Trying to protect Helena means he ends up destroying her and himself, much like asserting power over the robots backfires. Maybe all that power-pursuing isn't such a great idea after all.

In order to control the robots, Domin plans to sow discontent among them. He wants to make it so they all hate each other. This is what Marx argued that capitalists do. That is, all the workers in all the countries have a common interest, but they don't realize it because those in power cultivate nationalism and racism to make workers think they should hate each other rather than work together. Domin is going to assert his power through hate and fear in the interest of his class (or as he would say in the interest of humanity.) Are you rooting for him at this point? He seems less like a hero than like a power-mad super villain, with his evil tricky schemes.

Gall says that Robots are superior to, or more powerful than, humans. They hate humans because humans are weaker. This seems confused. Shouldn't you hate people who are stronger? If you're stronger, you don't need to fear, right? And yet, people (and robots) do actually often hate the weak for being weak—because people (and robots) kind of suck.