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7) One of these days fairly soon you know you're going to wake up needing some booty really BAD.

You know, Diet Coke really burns when you aspirate it up your nose. That was funny, really funny. And I know I am not adding anything of substance to the discussion.

Many threads on other sites have discussed child bonding and the ethics of marriage Vulcan style. I was thinking of joining the conversation, but I think my take on Koss was best expressed in my story "The Commission" which is on this site. I like what Alelou posted a couple of comments back in this thread. And I know mine is a minority voice in a sea of Koss haters, but I (gulp) LIKE Koss. I thought the actor played him as an honest and sympathetic character. And I think in Koss's last scene where he releases T'Pol from the marriage, the character was played as almost in tears.

Yeah, I still think Koss' character is mixed at best.

He was willing to release her from the marriage but at that point it was just as concievable that he just didn't want to be a part of any more embarassment. It's impossible to distinguish, from what we saw, truly benevolent motives from self preservatory motives.

And also, let's not forget that one way or another he did extort marriage from her. On the one hand we're kind of saying "well maybe he DID care about her" but also saying "Vulcans don't generally have any concept of love". So either he didn't care about her and he was trying to extort marriage with his family's influence as leverage and then let her out of the agreement when it became clear that it was no longer practical, or he did care about her but he extorted marriage from her even though it didn't appear to be at all what she wanted.

One may be able to argue that he had one of those "I know what's better for you better than you do" complexes that are oh-so-common to arranged-marriage/patriarchially-dominated cultures but that didn't really come out.

When he said something like, "We WILL be married" and raised his eyebrows, I basically just saw a cold, resolved, unfeeling determination motivated by something wholly divorced of emotion or caring. It was more like ambition or just a meglomaniacal need to win.

Oh, and Alelou, you're right, I didn't mean to imply that ALL Vulcans' marriages were facades - I just meant that there would be some, if there were other Vulcans with emotions as close to the surface as T'Pol's. And out of the millions or billions of Vulcans, you're likely to see quite a few of these childhood matchups -- which are for all intents and purposes RANDOM -- lead to zero compatibility.

I hope I never will be in need of a lawyer, but if that should happen, I will call you, Elessar!

Anyway, joking aside, I agree with you.
In my opinion, your analysis is absolutely right.
But, Linda, that doesn't mean that I don't appreciate your ideas.
Because, at the bottom, Koss is really the result of his civilization.
And the point is exactly here.

Anybody who had read my stuff knows what I think about Koss. But there are good things to be said about tradition too. I do not advocate blind adherence. But neither should a person be willing to throw away something that has stood the test of time just because they are bored. Sometimes, new ideas need just don't work out well. Betamax anyone?

But then, I am a product of the American tradition of rebellious independence. This particular tradition (rebellious independence) has stood the test of time so I see no reason to abandon it.

Well said!
I like- very much - your pride of being what you are!