The robot has some pretty solid comedic timing, you have to give it that...

PublishedDecember 30, 2025 6:57 PM EST•UpdatedDecember 30, 2025 6:57 PM EST

I'm fascinated by robotics and the many uses that we have for them.

But I think I'm even more fascinated by the misuses of them, and I think accidentally using a robot to kick yourself in the gonads counts under that category.

There's a video making the rounds of a man "teleoperating" a humanoid robot in what looks like some kind of office or robo-lab. If you think about the word "teleoperating" for like six seconds, you can figure out what it means. The man is controlling the robot by way of some kind of motion capture device.

READ: CEO GETS OBLITERATED BY KICK FROM HIS COMPANY’S ROBOT TO PROVE IT ISN’T CGI

Back in my day, we'd have just called this "remote control," but I guess that doesn't sound futuristic enough.

So the fella in this video looks to be shadow boxing with the robot mimicking his movements with a slight delay. However, the guy decided to showboat a little and delivered some sort of kung fu kick.

The first went off without a hitch. However, the second one caused him to have a momentary lapse in spatial awareness and strayed right into the path of his robo-pupil and took a swift robo-boot to the nards.

Now, we've got to look at this with a grain of salt, what with AI videos running rampant online… but this seems to be legit robotic crotch kicking.

I love that in that tweet, the guy mentions Asimov's Laws of Robotics, the first of which states that a robot must not harm a human.

Seems like a good ol' fashioned robot rule breakin', unless you consider this: did the robot kick that guy in the crotch, or did he kick himself in the crotch with the robot?

I would argue it's the latter. If you put that robot in self-driving mode and it turns around and plants a foot square in your toolbag, then yeah, it definitely broke those laws that science fiction writer Isaac Asimov wrote for the robots in his stories, but we still apply them to actual robots for some reason.

But, if this guy was telling the robot what to do and just lost track of where he was after delivering that sweet Jean-Claude Van Damme kick, well then, as I see it, he kicked himself in the nuts via that robot.

Still, it's an interesting thought exercise about the ethics of robotics… and kicking yourself in the testicles.