wheeeee tmbd analysis time- this relates to my post about the tmbd fandom seems to have a misconception about how mb is wrong about how secunits are perceived.
so. i was just thinking idly today and my brain stumbled upon the thought "the issue with murderbot's perspective of its oppression is not that it doesn't understand its oppression (it most certainly fucking does, see literally every comment its ever made about the way CR treats secunits), it's that murderbot struggles to accept that rather than reasonable control of weapons, it, and other secunits, are subject to unreasonable control as people." which i think is entirely justified.
the thing is, murderbot is a secunit, meant to protect and secure, and it is being faced with the horrifyingly large scale sanctioned torture and murder of its species. (which. i will always identify constructs as a separate species to humans, in that they are not humans or bots, but something entirely unique that neither other group can be without also being a construct.) it cannot do anything about it, the oppression of secunits is bloody-fucking-well overwhelming. every single construct is born oppressed. (born is used here to indicate coming online, and/or being made.)
like. i refer to governor modules as cosmic horror capitalism torture devices for a reason. it is mostly a joke, but i chose "cosmic horror" rather than anything else because the total scale is absolutely fucking horrifying. cosmic horror is many things, and one of those things, predominantly is that it is horror based on scale, specifically a scale so large that we cannot comprehend its size.
if murderbot were to recognise its personhood, it would come directly face-to-face with that, and face that it has no power to change it, and murderbot hates being helpless.
but i had another point to this, which is why i referenced the post i did earlier, because i wanted to also discuss the fact that so many people seem to automatically assume (at least from my perspective) that murderbot does not and cannot understand its oppression. (which, generally, that is an asshole fucking notion and is tied to pretty much every single other form of oppression out there (hello white saviour, but also things like autism speaks and certain forms of sexism (aka when men think women should be saved from their own lack of understanding) and those allies).)
it very well understands its oppression, how it is oppressed, and all the ways it, and the rest of the constructs, are mistreated. the issue is accepting that it is unreasonable, because constructs are not weapons or toys where control is reasonable, but rather people. (i could make a whole other post dedicated to this and how ganaka pit has shaped mb inherently and drives its actions considerably, and has only in the most recent books started to let the incident that happened there go.)
edit: meant to mention something (i actually wrote this post to say it, but i fucking forgot :/).
on the point of murderbot actually understanding its oppression, can we please stop acting like oppressed people cannot possibly understand their oppression without someone else, who is not apart of the oppressed group, showing them their oppression. like, this isn't exactly analogous, but still. seriously, people, i feel like the people living the actual fucking situation have a better understanding than someone fucking outside it.
