Shower thought ramblings about the doublestandard I keep seeing between "why don't people ship mensahbot?" questions (by people who are looking for mensahbot ships) and then those who don't ship mensahbot saying their lack of shipping is inherently inevitable due to how unsuitable Mensah is to be shipped.
Then they provide a big long list of all the ways Mensah isn't suitable for shipping, downplaying her as a complex character with a complex relationship and lots of material and potential to explore in all kinds of shapes and forms.
So off the top of my head, some "reasons Mensah isn't shipped with Murderbot despite being its favourite human and closest friend" that piss me off:
There's no tension/friction/hurt-comfort between Mensah and Murderbot so there's nothing to explore about them/they're too perfect and pure for shipping.
She literally owns it and this is repeatedly brought up as a source of tension between them. It gets sharp, sarcastic and makes jabbing jokes. The power imbalance dynamic is a HUGE spaceship in the room that they're both afraid to talk about.
It has trust issues with Mensah, they specifically talk about this in Exit Strategy. It is her friend, and it doesn't trust her.
The whole codependency thing? Tension and conflict with a huge side of guilt in both of them! So much misunderstandings to explore.
Mensah siding with it against her team, her councillors, her planetary advisors, her family, her children. It's presence brings so much tension into her life in all corners of it! We have repeated examples of Mensah getting into angry stressful arguments for it.
They're different species and Mensah misunderstood it so bad in ASR that it ran away. Plenty of room for misunderstandings to happen between them.
THE MURDERING?! It's like a key plot point in Exit Strategy? And Fugitive Telemetry? And Network Effect?! She is willing to argue with it over the murder and it backs down and is willing to stop killing for HER.
They don't play off against each other, there's no bickering or joking or banter.
Murderbot's first joke is with Mensah. Mensah also jokes with it. They also argue in jokingly fashions. They are needling at each other, poking at each other, nudging on boundaries. Murderbot is sending her wild purchase magazine requests during meetings and Mensah's response to it asking how her trauma treatment is going is to poke fun at how it got kidnapped and nearly died.
They are bantering with each other all the time, making self-depreciating jokes and poking at each other's weaknesses.
Feed sex is the better sex orientated to a construct and you can only get that with ART, other constructs or augmented humans / no biological sex.
Mensah has an internal implant.
We know SecUnit can feel her emotions over the feed since All Systems Red, since it was in connection with her damn near 24/7, and we know she can also feel its emotions over the connection in Exit Strategy.
SecUnit cut the connection to Mensah's implant because the malware attack would have hurt her like an augmented person.
She's not augmented but she's certainly capable of non-biological feed sex.
Skill issue. It's science fiction. Get creative.
Mensah can't comfort it over the feed or connect with it on that level.
Gestures again: she has an internal implant that's hardly explored at all. She absolutely can comfort and connect with it emotionally over the feed.
Their love for each other is so canon and set in stone there's nothing to experiment with/no room to write different takes.
Neither of them can even define their relationship, they are the definition of "What is your relationship?" "I don't know"
Also pick your point in the canon, they go from strangers to cautious friends that don't trust each other to boss/security guard to family to therapy buddies to ???
How come perihelion is so worthy of continuous exploration outside of canon because of all the tidbits to play with, but Mensah's tidbits are too much?
So have fun with wild and cracky fanon explorations? Give them the blorbo treatment?
There's nothing freaky or toxic between them to play with:
The way Mensah ignores its physical boundaries when she's anxious.
The way SecUnit ignores her privacy.
The way SecUnit casually manhandles her all the time.
Martha Wells said they would be toxic if it had stayed at end of ASR.
TV specific - she did SPINAL SURGERY ON IT. Her hands were in its SPINE and she pulled out its NEURAL CORD.
She also did lubricant surgery on it.
SO MUCH medical first aid fic potential
Mensah is too happy and stable in life, her background is too happy, there's no drama or angst or whump.
Mensah has been shot, blown up, kidnapped, tortured (psychologically at minimum and likely physically), isolated, objectified, traumatised, legal battles, had family members kidnapped, assassins sent after her, family members shot at, has PTSD and anxiety and ruminating thoughts, GIANT guilt complex about Murderbot...
She is reluctant to undergo therapy, is stubborn and pretends like she is fine so well that NOBODY but Murderbot KNOWS she's an anxious codependent wreck that has to be blackmailed into getting therapy that nobody else knows she's undertaking.
She's doing so badly she had to quit one of her jobs.
Her canonical role is to be its parent.
That's your interpretation, it's not a factual canon.
Whatever they've got going on is so fucking weird multiple people are confused.
They are both constantly asked by other people what their relationship is and what Murderbot's intentions to her are. Generally that's not the kind of thing you ask someone you think is taking on a child/student role.
They have relationship "breaking up" dating jokes with each other.
They manhandle each other
They also have serious discussions with each other about their relationship and how they DONT want to break up.
Some people have a mommy kink/incest kink/the forbidden kinks so lots of room to play in that.
It's in a canonical relationship with Perihelion
That's your interpretation.
"But Martha Wells said...." MW said that it is a valid interpretation and that she had it in mind when writing it. She did not say that is how it is in the books.
When Martha Wells said ART is the most important person in Murderbot's life she immediately followed up with a clarification that Mensah is ALSO the most important person in its life.
The worldbuilding normalises poly relationships
Perihelion and Gurathin are just like Murderbot, they mirror it! Mensah is too different.
The whole reason she understands it so well is because she mirrors it perfectly and constantly? She knows instantly that its helping. She doesn't need to be threatened or governor moduled because Murderbot is doing what she would do.
They're both anxious sacrificial wrecks who put saving everyone else on their own shoulders? Who keep everyone behind them and protect everyone else?
Have you not read the short story where they both have the same thought patterns about each other?
And Mensah specifically muses about how similar they are, as does Murderbot constantly comparing itself to Mensah, and then in the TV show there is an entire episode dedicated to exploring how despite how different they appear - they are the SAME.
They are each other's heroes in each other's eyes.
Perihelion and Gurathin have so much opportunity for unrequited and dark storylines!
So does Mensah, you don't think she can't have unrequited feelings for Murderbot?
You don't think Murderbot thinking about her constantly and comparing everyone it meets to her, doesn't have room to be explored as unrequited?
Dark storyline potential - hello she legally owns it, she's the only person it will take orders from.
Dark storyline potential - the codependency and guilt. The interrogations and suspicions of Mensah's family. It COULD be abusing or manipulating her, it would be so easy for it do to!
Martha Wells herself has talked about AUs where they would have had a dark relationship and a power imbalance if it had stayed at end of ASR.
No aroace potential because Mensah is clearly sexual so no "sex but not sex" funtimes.
They're already practically in one in the canon.
she's poly and aware of Murderbot's preferences and entirely willing to work with them. This is your skill issue, that you think they can't be having an aroace or non-sexual kinky relationship.
Most Mensahbot shippers ship them for their queerplatonic third mysterious unlabelled thing.
Holding hands can be kinky and sexual.
TV Mensah does sexual surgery on it where she carved it a spine vulva. They have jokes about first times while she does this.
You can't do an OT3 with Mensahbot
Yes you can. Skill issue.
She's already poly, if anything she's the easiest character to OT+ with.
ART is over the moon about Mensah visiting, Murderbot is baffled by it. It cleaned itself over and over like it was dressing up for a date. ART and Mensah have private conversations with each other about Murderbot. Murderbot and Mensah have conversations with each other about ART. All three of them have a drive to protect their teams/crew, all three of them are protectors, all three of them have been KIDNAPPED and held against their will and traumatised. ART and Mensah are incredibly similar, they both prioritise giving Murderbot choices and space, they both give it a home, they both invite it in and they both know the importance of leaving it free and LETTING IT GO.
TV Gurathin has a crush on Mensah, pretty easy to turn that into an OT3 setup. Hero worship. Savior complex. Jealousy. “Why can’t you move me”
Mensahbotcule is an OT4 that is practically canon.
Mensah's already in a marriage/relationship so doesn't need to be with Murderbot.
She's poly. She's in a poly arrangement. OT4 them and get creative.
She is explicitly poly and committed to life with Murderbot via the legal stuff.
It can be fun to explore unconventional dynamics and also her two partners are really cool and worth exploring.
So because of that nothing to explore with Mensahbot as a ship so that's why it’s a rare pair despite being the two main characters.
This is a double standard.
This is a lack of giving Mensah the deep dive blorbo treatment others are willing to give to Perihelion and Gurathin.
This is an honest skill issue.
You simply haven't looked.
You don’t have to ship it but stop fucking denying its potential because you don’t like it.
You can't close your eyes then insist that's why there is nothing there.
Sometimes the statements being made that I see are so copy paste, from different individuals, that I wonder if there isn't an old "Essay on why Mensah isn't shippable" floating around that the “reasons” are pulled from when people try to explain why it's rare.
There's a willingness to over-analyse and go wild with any stray line or tidbit with either Perihelion (who has lots of canon content) or Gurathin (who had shit all until recently), to use all those to build up many headcanons, fanons, meta... and then reluctance to apply these same deep dives and "run away with a minor detail" to Mensah. Instead, shallow first impressions are held up as all there is to her.
(tbh I have far more respect for someone who's "idk I just like the man/spaceship more" instead of writing essays downplaying and straight up denying canon info about Mensah. Stop erasing her complexity and sanding off her sharp bits -_- )
