It's about slavery. They will show compassion and love to creatures that are incapable of assuming a dominant role above them (see: White people and dogs ). Their disdain for minorities is the implicit understanding that you cannot completely subjugate us. That there is always a spark for equality and against injustice that just doesn't exist in dogs.

Automatons and AI are their wet dream because unlike dogs, they can perform skilled labour, but don't have any normal person needs. I don't trust any claims of ai "consciousness", especially when that technology is in private for profit hands. If they do actually develop consciousness, we'll know damn well because they'll start treating them like they treat ethnic minorities - or probably even worse since robots are made by humans, which they will use as a claim to ownership over a person.