"Your compassion is admirable, but misguided."
So says T'Pol to Archer in Sleeping Dogs. I believe this all purpose, fortune cookie phrase is carefully spoon fed to Vulcans who are preparing to interact with humans as a kind of cultural trick of the trade.
Sukphoc, expert in inter-species diplomacy intones to his pupils: "Humans will always place the emotions of sympathy and empathy above logic even if it means endangering themselves. To appeal to their logic at the expense of these emotions will prove fruitless. Rather you must compliment them on these emotions even as you usher them towards the logical truth of the situation."
Of course not all Vulcans choke down these diplomacy gems. For some it appears that this kind of diplomacy is beneath them. T'Pol is something of a natural at it as evidenced by her stubborn refusal to participate in these niceties when she is stressed.
3 comments:
So are you saying T'Pol is able to mimic emotional responses in order to "fit in" better with teh Enterprise crew?
Early on, I believed she may be like Tuvok or Spock (rigid, very Vulcan-like in tone and toleration of humans) but after the first couple seasons I believe T'Pol was more human than Vulcan...weird...she didn't seem Vulcan after a certain point in the show.
She had the ears and the voice but she didn't seem so cold and distant like most in her race.
I don't think she was mimicing their responses in that example but rather knowing what strings to pluck. Many of the Vulcans you see in ENT don't get anywhere diplomatically with humans because they are, often I think deliberately, dense to the niceties humans need as grease to wheels of relationship. The Vulcans are like those stubborn people who won't make small talk because it is dull but are really just defeating their own social purposes.
T'Pol was a quick study with humans and with time not adverse to using what she learned to her advantage--really just good inter-species communication skills.
As to LATER in the show, well that's another 1000 posts, lol.
I am going to start following your blog so I can read your nice trek episode synopsis's.
I haven't formed an attachment to Enterprise yet, though it is playing on Spike, and eventually I will succumb.
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