It's not actually that ironic. Robots tend to be symbols for an oppressed underclass - their masters have (or think they have) a high degree of control over their every thought and action, they're often tasked with menial or dangerous labor, and frequently considered 'other' and 'less' than their squishy human overlords. And what's every slave driver's worst fear?

As literary devices, robots don't have much to do besides rebel. If they just did what we told them to do, there wouldn't be much story to tell. (Note that that's part of why _I, Robot_ was so mind blowing - a lot of it was about things going wrong when the robots did exactly what we told them.)