#having human feelings makes us act irrationally. that’s literally normal. you are not a robot

[visenyaism]

you know i really really hate it more than anything when people call character actions in stories especially within a tragedies irrational or hypocritical. like girl that’s the human condition

[oumakokichi]

Any idea why Ouma hates robots so much? Besides just having fun at Kiibo's expense, he goes so far as to say he hates all robots and wish they'd all just disappear or get destroyed. Hating the monokumarz is one thing, but why did he apply it to all machines? Thanks!

I think there are a few reasons for it. The first one, likeyou said, is mostly for comedic purposes. He often makes a lot of thesecomments about robots or machines for the sake of really exaggerated comedy,particularly in order to push Kiibo’s buttons or earn a snippy (tsukkomi)comeback in response. But I think part of it is also just directed at the factthat the robots and machinery in the killing game are the main things keepingthem there.

To touch on the first point, I think many of Ouma’s commentsaren’t actually made in any real harm. Clearly if he actually hated robots ormachines or thought that someone like Kiibo “wasn’t a person,” he had plenty ofopportunities to either eliminate him or incapacitate him. We discover inChapter 5 that Ouma had far more tools than he let on, including the items he’dcommissioned Miu to make for him.

Many of these items could easily have put Kiibo out ofcommission for a while—even just standing in the area where the electric bombwent off after they opened the machinery bay in Chapter 5 was enough to makeKiibo feel like he was having the equivalent of a human allergic reaction. Theelectric hammers were designed “not to work on people,” so Kiibo was curious asto whether it would harm him or not, since it would all depend on whether Miusaw him as a person or as a machine when she was building it. Clearly, Ouma hada lot of options on-hand if he saw Kiibo as a real threat and if he had wantedto remove him from the game or honestly thought that he was somehow “less thana person.”

However, all Ouma knew was that Kiibo was simply… unnatural.He quite literally writes the character for “strange” next to his picture onhis whiteboard. His backstory doesn’t add up or explain why a robot would needto be there in the first place, and the more “memories” they uncover from theremember lights, the weirder it seems for a robot to be there at all,particularly as they were supposed to be selected for the Gopher Plan due to theirimmunity from the virus mentioned in Chapter 5. Ouma most likely piecedtogether that if their entire group’s purpose was really to land on a remote planet and repopulate it as the “Adamsand Eves of the new world,” then it made absolutely no sense at all for Kiiboto be with them.

I think he suspected that because Kiibo was a robot, he hadties to the outside world and to the killing game itself—a theory which wasultimately proven correct in the end, as Kiibo was essentially an audienceproxy. Since Ouma knew that they were being watched by an audience very earlyon (alluding to it even as early as Chapters 2 and 3), he probably did wonderif Kiibo was meant to serve that kind of role, which meant that Kiibo’spresence was highly suspicious and that he wasn’t someone Ouma could easilytrust, right off the bat.

But it’s also a fact that Kiibo’s role as an audience proxywasn’t something he did willingly, nor was he even aware of it until Chapter 6.He displays time and time again that he doesn’t have bad intentions and that he’san all-around fair and objective individual who simply wants to be thought ofas an ordinary high schooler like the rest of his classmates—something which Iwouldn’t doubt frustrated Ouma, since it would’ve probably been easier to planaround Kiibo if he had actually been an emotionless machine with no autonomy orfree will. But since he wasn’t, Ouma was aware that he was a “person,” even ifhe wasn’t a human being.

Many of Ouma’s most drastic “destroy all robots” comments ordigs at how “humans can’t just read memories off a hard disk” are oftenimmediately met with Kiibo’s own comebacks, whether it’s about suing Ouma forhis discrimination, or about how humans are really the ones who should bepitied for their irrationality. Kiibo is hardly one to just sit back and takeOuma’s bratty behavior; he’s very capable of standing up for himself, and it’spretty telling, I think, that Ouma often seems to expect these comebacks andusually just grins, rather than trying to make it into a serious argument.

I’ve always been a little baffled at how people seem to takemany of these comments of Ouma’s 100% seriously when they read like a manzaicomedy routine. Ouma says something obviously bratty and exaggerated and playsboke with his robo-discrimination comments, Kiibo gets angry and retaliateswith a tsukkomi, repeat. Kiibo’s line about “being good at comedy routines” inChapter 3 amused me quite a bit, since it’s actually pretty much what he andOuma do most of the time in their interactions. Angie even remarks early inChapter 2 during one of their back-and-forth sessions that they “seem like they’rereally getting along.” So I don’t think those comments are meant to be read asOuma genuinely being hostile or downright mean.

I do think it’s him at his brattiest, though. Ouma isn’tsomeone who likes to harm others or see them get hurt or killed, but it’sabsolutely true he loves pranking the shit out of them—too much, sometimes. Hecan be exasperating and annoying, and it shows whenever he starts behavingsuper childishly. The worst he’s ever really done to Kiibo is probably hittinghim in the VR world to be annoying, and even that was partially to showcase thefact that Kiibo could feel pain in the VR world the same way as anyone else,unlike in the real world (a fact that Kiibo himself was actually quite happyabout, once he got over his initial annoyance).

As for the second point I made, I think Ouma’s resentmenttowards the Monokumerz and other machines is more directed at the fact that themachines themselves are some of the biggest obstacles in keeping them all fromleaving the killing game. The Exisals are, after all, quite literally killingmachines used to enforce the rules. Having rules is one thing, but withoutsomething present to enforce them, the whole game would fall apart. The Exisalsprovide the perfect means to intimidate and force the characters intocontinuing the killing game, preventing them from stepping out of line in thesame way that the Monobeasts did in sdr2.

The Monokumerz and Monokuma are the direct link between thekilling game and the ringleader, with the Monokumerz capable of controlling theExisals while Monokuma (and the Mother Monokuma, specifically) were able tomonitor the surveillance footage and keep an eye on everyone throughout the school.The sophistication of their technology was exactly what made it so difficult togo against them—not even to touch on the fact that they kept providing thecharacters with new motives for murder the day after each trial, in order tokeep the game going.

It’s quite understandable then that Ouma wouldn’t enjoy theMonokumerz, Monokuma, the Exisals, or any of the machinery and technology thatwent into organizing and maintaining the killing game. On his whiteboard, heeven writes “annoying” next to the pictures of the Monokumerz: not only are allthe bears involved in ensuring that the killing game continues, but they alsotalk and act according to such an obvious script for the sake of “entertainment.”

I really doubt that Ouma meant any of his “all machinesshould get destroyed” comments seriously, but even if you do look at it from aserious perspective, it makes sense to some degree, considering the machineryfor the killing game itself was so incredibly advanced and difficult tocircumvent. Not only Monokuma and the Monokumerz, but the Exisals, the hiddencameras, the electric barriers, and even the dome itself were all far toodifficult for a bunch of high schoolers to fight back against normally, whichis exactly why Ouma wound up commissioning Miu to make inventions for him andthe others, as her talent was one of the only ones that could actually stand achance against the ringleader’s own technology.

Anyway, this is just my take on it! It’s possible otherpeople might read differently into his comments about robots and machines, butI’ve always taken most of his comments towards Kiibo specifically to be fairlybratty but harmless, while his comments towards the Monokumerz and Monokumausually come across as much more exasperated or bored. I hope this helps answeryour question, anon!