“Haven”
Written by Trace Tormé (Story by Trace Tormé and Lan O’Kun)
Directed by Richard Compton
Season 1, Episode 11
Original air date: November 30, 1987
Star date: 41294.5
Mission summary
Enterprise visits Haven for a brief respite, but the peaceful planet is no safe harbor for Counselor Troi: Her eccentric Betazoid mother ambushes her there, along with Troi’s long-forgotten human fiancé and his parents.
She meets her soon-to-be husband, Wyatt Miller, for the first time since they were genetically bonded as kids in a game of house that went too far. He seems strangely disappointed when he sees her again, as if she weren’t quite what he was expecting. She gets that a lot.
When Lwaxana Troi—Daughter of the Fifth House, Holder of the Sacred Chalice of Rixx, Heir to the Holy Rings of Betazed—beams aboard, she isn’t what anyone was expecting. A full Betazoid, she’s a powerful telepath and she isn’t shy about flaunting it. She and Captain Picard hit it off right away. The same can’t be said for the bride’s mother and Wyatt’s parents, not to mention Commander Riker and Troi’s beau.
Everyone is relieved when a B-plot appears to distract from Troi’s budding romance: a plague ship bearing the last survivors of Tarella, a world destroyed by biological warfare. The ship is on course for Haven and refuses all attempts at communication. The First Electorine of Haven is somewhat freaked by the whole thing and demands Picard destroy the approaching vessel.
Meanwhile, Troi visits Wyatt in his quarters to get to know him a little better, where she discovers his collection of sketches of another woman. Awkward. The tall, blonde stranger is literally the girl of his dreams; he’s seen her face and heard her whispering his name since he was a boy. He’d just assumed it was Troi reaching out to him with her Betazoid mind, because that would have been totally normal and healthy.
The Tarellian ship continues to ignore Enterprise’s urgent hails, so Picard is forced to hold the refugees in a tractor beam to prevent them from transporting down to Haven. That gets their attention. The ship’s captain contacts them and introduces his daughter, Ariana, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Wyatt’s dream girl! Troi dramatically states the obvious: “It’s the woman in Wyatt’s drawings.” Dr. Crusher, meanwhile, works with Wyatt–a medical doctor who took a class on the Terellian plague once (really!)–to put together a “good luck, don’t ever call” care package of medicine that may be a promising start to research for a cure.
The Tarellians just want to settle on a quiet island somewhere on Haven to die off, but that’s not Picard’s call to make. Wyatt saves them all the trouble by beaming over to the vessel to meet up with Ariana, who has been dreaming of him, too, for all these years. Turns out, she’s always wanted to marry a doctor—someone who might be able to cure their disease. Now that Wyatt’s infected, he can never leave the ship. Looks like the wedding’s off and the Millers haven’t gained a daughter, they’ve lost a son. No one seems surprised or put out by this completely unexpected development, least of all Riker.
Lwaxana Troi departs, firing off one last joke to embarrass Captain Picard. With all that drama behind them, it’s off to the next mission. “Our destiny is elsewhere,” Picard says. “But I’m happy that yours is here with us, Counselor.”
That makes one of us.
Analysis
The introduction of Lwaxana Troi rescues this episode from complete mediocrity, but doesn’t entirely redeem it. Many of the recurring character’s appearances on TNG and DS9 are fan favorites and she is one of the most interesting and nuanced guest roles on these series, largely thanks to Majel Barrett’s superb performances. Her flirtatious interactions with Captain Picard are pure comic gold, because they push him well out of his comfort zone. Patrick Stewart also reveals his considerable comedic skill; his subtle reaction when he lifted Lwaxana’s luggage was a laugh out loud moment for me in an episode that more frequently elicited sighs of frustration and eye-rolling.
Alas, as wonderful as Lwaxana Troi is, her surprise visits on TNG also somehow make Deanna Troi even more annoying, making her act like a whiny teenager instead of her usual role as a whiny counselor. Admittedly, this is realistic behavior—how many of us revert to childish petulance around our parents? But that doesn’t mean it’s something I want to watch.
“Haven” feels more like a clumsy soap opera than a space opera, with Riker sullen, aggressive, and jealous of Wyatt, brooding his way through the episode. As Troi’s former Imzadi, “Bill” feels perfectly justified in behaving as though he has some claim over her, or as if she should wait around for him forever. Wyatt handles the entire situation graciously, as graciously as Picard handles Lwaxana, and I was amused when Troi and her boyfriend took over Riker’s holodeck program to make out. (But seriously, why can anyone walk into another person’s holodeck program whenever they feel like it?) The “chameleon rose” Troi toted around for a while also came off as forced symbolism, and never really pays off.
It might seem silly to complain about the ridiculous psychic connection that inexplicably has linked Ariana and Wyatt over a lifetime in an episode that features a telepath, but it seems too incredible, kind of clichéd, and too melodramatic. It turns the premise into an argument for fate and mysticism: They’re meant to be together, they coincidentally arrived at Haven at just the right moment to meet, and oh, he’s the only person who can save the Tarellians’ lives. Did M. Night Shyamalan write this? We’re set up for a happy, magical ending with Picard’s innocuous comment in the teaser that legends “have a way of sometimes coming true,” but that bit of foreshadowing isn’t enough to make me buy what he’s selling.
On the plus side, we get some interesting background on the Betazed culture, including their famous naked wedding ceremony. I liked the idea behind the Tarellians and their plight, and had their story been the focus of the plot, the story of the forgotten betrothal even might have worked. Unfortunately, these plot points were not only wasted, but they were used as justification for further moralizing by the writers–and the enlightened Starfleet crew. About Troi’s arranged marriage, Picard says, “It seems to me that she is trapped by a custom of her home world which the facts of the twenty-fourth century life have made unwise and unworkable. I wish I could intervene.” Methinks there’s some thinly veiled criticism of how appropriate such agreements are in the twentieth century as well.
And then there’s this little exchange:
DATA: Tarella was class M, much like your Earth, with similar humanoid life forms. Unfortunately they faced the old story of hatred outpowering intelligence.
PICARD: There were hostilities?
DATA: Between the inhabitants of their two land masses, resulting in one group unleashing a deadly biological weapon on the other.
CRUSHER: And in the end the other became infected as well. Makes one question the sanity of humanoid forms.
Finally, I have to point out that it doesn’t make much sense for the tractor beam to prevent the Tarellians from beaming down to Haven but not prevent Wyatt from beaming over to their ship from Enterprise. Or maybe their transporter beams are just so much better?
This episode is sometimes humorous but more often annoying, the “twist” and resolution are predictable, and–worst of all–it’s frankly boring.
Eugene’s Rating: Warp 2 (on a scale of 1-6)
Thread Alert: It’s hard to choose just one outfit to hold up for ridicule among all the others, but I think the prize goes to Deanna’s party outfit, which is just an even more ridiculous variation on her usual wardrobe. No wonder they want her to be nude at her wedding: She just has no fashion sense, no matter what intoxicated Yar says.
Best Line: MR. HOMN: Thank you for the drinks. (We should all follow Homn’s example as we try to get through the rest of this season.)
Trivia/Other Notes: Armin Shimerman played the role of the Betazoid gift box.
Richard Compton (director) appeared twice on Star Trek, as Washburn in “The Doomsday Machine” and as a Romulan officer in “The Enterprise Incident.”
Previous episode: Season 1, Episode 10 – “Hide and Q.”
Next episode: Season 1, Episode 12 – “The Big Goodbye.”
Oh God, kill it with fire! I never, ever learned to like Lwaxana. Yes, her presence usually meant a little discombobulation of Picard for some laughs, but the payoff was never enough to cover the cost of her presence. She was even worse on DS9 where there was no chemistry at all. Tracy Tormé did some decent work later on, particularly on Sliders, but his TNG work never rose beyond mediocre and this was not his best TNG effort by far.
Oh yes, except for Majel’s performance this episode to remarkably boring and predicatable. Ever chance at decent conflict, drained away until it was as bloodless Lady Lucy by the end of Dracula.
This episode managed to hit several writerly buttons for me as I watched it last night. That briefing scene was an like being hit by an 18 wheel exposition truck as each character got a turn at telling the history of the tarellians, not one moment of conflict or of character. The same essential information could have been woven into an argument between Picard and the head of the planet as she insisted that Tareillans be destroyed — citing their history as proof of the dangers, and Picard countering with the tragic end that they have come to because of it. Conflict, character, and exposition in one scene.
Also it bugs me when writers don’t friggin name things that would have names. If this planet and their plague wars were such well studied history then we would net get, ‘one group’ did this and ‘the other group’ did that, there would be names for thos factions and people would know them. grrrr
Another writerly thing that bugs me is when characters don;t mesh with their history and backstory. Why does Troi resist her cultural traditions? They don’t set up that Troi is a rebel (hell that would be amoment of character, can’t have that.) So Riker chose duty over love this would have beena great chance at having the show oin the other foot as Troi, without a whine, accepting her duty, happily over duty. If she was bonded to this guy years ago and she is not a rebel wouldn’t she have been looking forward to this? Also, just how the hell were the Millers ever friendly with the Trois? I can understand people growing apart, but I saw nothing to base on which these families would have bonded over. I’m trying to think of think 30 years earlier and these people so close that pledging their off-spring to each other made sense and I can’t see it.
Sooo… my favorite bit about the chameleon rose is how it doesn’t change color as Troi visibly moves through a whole suite of different emotional states. Good thing it’s pretty accurate — staying… white.
As for the Terellians & the tractor beam, the beam isn’t supposed to block the transporter, it’s supposed to keep them out of transport range of the planet. I can believe that, since their ship seems to be not capable of warp (if they’re traveling at sublight speeds…?)
Question: Is Starfleet really so lax that J. Random Civilian can just up and transport onto a plague ship with nobody stopping him? Really?
#3, DeepThought: “Question: Is Starfleet really so lax that J. Random Civilian can just up and transport onto a plague ship with nobody stopping him? Really?”
Heh, what a silly question. How often, back to the TOS days, has some variation on the following conversation occurred:
BRIDGE OFFICER: Sir, someone has just opened the door to Starfleet’s greatest secrets.
CAPTAIN: Override!
BRIDGE OFFICER: Too late, sir.
CAPTAIN: Open a hailing frequency.
[beep]
CAPTAIN: Whoever you are, stop stealing Starfleet’s greatest secrets or I will be forced to hail you a second time.
THIEF: Too late! [blows raspberry]
I always enjoyed seeing Lwaxana. Majel Barrett did such a good job with her that it at least made an otherwise terrible episode bearable. To a point.
For all the sins of this particular episode (and lo, there were many) they didn’t really seem to matter to me. After the dreck that appears before this point, I just like having the opportunity to laugh.
I forgot about the changing colored rose that doesn’t change color at all once Troi puts it on. I suspect that the director forgot about it too.
There’s so much I hate about this episode.
First of all, Riker is such a smarmy bastard. The opening scene where he’s sitting alone watching holographic girls strum a harp with this skeevy smile on his face is just icky and weird. He rolls his eyes when they call him to the transporter room–why? If they’re calling him, wouldn’t he be on duty? But the whole time he behaves like a selfish jerk. Troi is visibly suffering through this ordeal–giving up her career, her life, and her friends, not to mention him–and he acts like she’s being unfair to him. Their relationship has been over for years now. What claim can he have to her at this point? If he really didn’t want her to marry someone else, well, insert obligatory Beyonce lyrics.
Secondly, this whole marriage tradition makes NO SENSE. Troi’s father was human. Troi’s father’s best friend was human. WHY would they insist on a traditional Betazed marriage bonding? It’s obviously not her mom who pushed for it, because she said she avoided them forever hoping it would just not come up (and how traditional can Lwaxana be if she a) married a human; and b) flirts with every Tom, Dick, and Harry that crosses her path?). It just doesn’t add up to me why any of this is taking place. If Troi’s father had been the Betazed and it had been his dying wish or something, okay. But no one seems to want this to go forward except maybe the boy’s parents, who, as humans who now live in Earth, should have zero investment in Betazed cultural traditions. In fact, they want a human wedding! Lwaxana and Deanna always reminded me of the Ab Fab ladies–if anyone wanted this to happen, it should have been conservative, duty-bound Deanna, who instead spends the whole episode looking like a wounded puppy.
Thirdly, the resolution is infuriating. Deanna resigns herself to this fate and then is saved from it by her fiance abandoning her. All the decisions about this marriage and its eventual dissolution are made with no input or agency on her part. She doesn’t choose to make this happen in the first place, and she hasn’t got the spine to reject it, either. She’s just carried along by the plot, made to suffer a little, given a glimmer of hope that this guy isn’t a total tool, and then gets dumped in front of everyone. Your heroine, ladies and gentlemen! Star Trek has never figured out what to do about women and marriage. They screwed it up in DS9, too, when [DS9 spoiler rot 13] Qnk zneevrf Jbes. Fur bowrpgf gb uvf vafvfgrapr gung fur qravtengr urefrys orsber uvf nqbcgvir zbgure, naq va gur raq vf funzrq naq uhzvyvngrq hagvy fur objf orsber gurz. Oyrpu oyrpu oyrpu.[/spoiler]
I do love Lwaxana though and I always have. She has a personality, which is more than you can say about the crew of dead fish that populate this first season. Her infuriating entitlement and self-absorption, inane chatter, and ability to totally deflate Deanna remind me of actual people I’ve known, unlike the paragons of perfection that everyone else represents.
I’m also giving this a Warp 2.
Oh, and thread alert props: I kind of love Lwaxana’s outfits, which manage to be outrageous, old-ladyish, and sexy all at once. (That open-backed dress is way sexier than any of the bodysuits Deanna wears.)
I assume the tractor beam was stopping the Tarellians from beaming down to the planet by holding the ship out of transporter range. This would obviously do anything about the fact that Enterprise was much closer.
HELP ME — I’M GOING TO BAT FOR A FIST SEASON EPISODE!
A completely forgettable episode. In fact, I had completely forgotten it, with nothing to distinguish it from the parade of episodes that featured the annoying Mrs. Troi.
IIRC, Tracy Tormé was one of the more talented early TNG writers, who introduced a number of lasting story arcs (including IIRC retrieving Worf from the dung heap of comic relief by installing in him some hint of a back story). But you’d hardly know it here.
The episode does almost nothing. It provides no particular insights into the characters. As Torie notes, it actually weakens the characters of Troi and Riker (assuming those characters could get any weaker at this point). It explores no important sci-fi or moral tropes. It advances no drama.
It’s just hard to believe that this “exciting new series of exploration”—with a pedigree of 20 years of fan support, films, and franchises—had so little to say so early on.
Aaaaaggh!! I hate Mama Troi!
Thanks for doing these Eugene and Torie. It is obvious you both have training in writing and story structure and I learn something new about each episode just reading your review.
Haven: Up until this point, it has been a very rough start for TNG. Personally, except for “Where no one has gone before” this season has been forgettable up until this episode. I agree with Lemnoc on all points. However, I still find myself giving a decent rating to this episode. Keep in mind I did not watch TOS and I was only 8 when this first aired on TV. Something about this one though made me think this series could evolve into something more.
1) I enjoyed the comedy Mrs. Troi provides. A welcome respite to the dullness these characters give us. The back and forth with her and Picard and even the uptight Mother of Wyatt made me smirk a few times. Love Mr. Homn.
2) Agree with Eugene on the constant season 1, “humans are better in the 24th century speeches”. Too much Roddenberry if you ask me.
3) Any chance Riker was written to be this bad to illustrate his growth by season 7? The maturing of a command officer? I guess he should not have been first officer of a Galaxy class ship with this level of immaturity in the first place but I’m trying to find a silver lining to Riker’s general dickesness.
4) Why does Picard wait until the alien ship is within transporter range of Haven to take action? Couldn’t the aliens have beamed down as soon as they were in range and contaminated the entire planet? Isn’t the only way to prevent transport in the first place to take action before they come within range of the planet?
5) Troi’s outburst at dinner. I know we’re supposed to feel a little bit like a child in front of our parents. I also get that we as the audience are meant to sympathize with Troi, but the acting was just so atrocious in the dinner scene I laughed instead.
6) Yar’s hair in the dinner scene is awesome 80’s.
7) I want to shove Dr. Crusher out the nearest airlock.
Warp: 3 (on the early season TNG scale).
>Any chance Riker was written to be this bad to illustrate his growth by season 7?
Oh, no. That is more forethought than anyone has shown in the history of Star Trek.
My strongest memory of this episode was of Mr. Homn. I wouldn’t even have been able to tell you the title, only that it was the first with Lwaxana. Mr. Homn was like Morn in DS-9 in that they were characters you’d notice and enjoy seeing even though they seemed little more than scenery in the story.
That telepathic connection is something that more fans should have picked up on. It would given them an excuse. “No wonder I’m so unsuccessful. Miss (or Mr.) right is still off on some other part of space.” Since for us telepathy is only a storytelling tool and not an everyday thing, you could argue that the writer can use it in any way. True, but if the way you use it doesn’t make sense the reader/viewer will not accept it. There has to be some connection. Some reason for a link to develop between characters who wouldn’t in any other way know that the other exists. “The legends say that…” is too weak. “This happened because he is the one who will…” is also too weak – unless you’ve already established that one party/species has the ability to ‘see’ the future. But then you’re probably more in the realm of fantasy and even in fantasy things should be happening for reasons. No. that was the weakest part of the story for me. Even the feel-good movie August Rush handled the concept of telepathy better than this episode. I’d even argue that that movie was a better sci-fi story than this episode.
I agree that the long forgotten arranged according to tradition marriage thing was a mistake. The character and situation setup in the episode Tin Man did more for that story than this setup could have done for this one.
I don’t assign scores or ratings here but if I did, I’d have to ask “What’s the lowest I can possibly go again?”
@3 Deep Thought @8 S. Hutson Blount
Ah… Thanks for clarifying the tractor beam thing. I didn’t follow that they were trying to keep it out of range of the planet. Still, wouldn’t it have been bad if they had beamed over to Enterprise instead? It seems risky when you don’t know who you’re dealing with.
@6 Torie
I’m glad you mentioned the holo porn. That was… unexpected. But he has a holodeck at his disposal and he calls up a desert? And great point on Deanna’s choices not mattering at all.
@11 ShameAndFailure
Thanks! I’m learning a lot too. Criticizing and discussing these episodes improves my own fiction writing!
6) Yar’s hair in the dinner scene is awesome 80′s.
There’s an 80s vibe to a lot of this episode and the season in general. I might be imagining it, but I think it feels less dated later on.
@ 9 Lemnoc
Both Riker and Deanna act like children throughout. Riker is the pouty boy who isn’t getting the attention he wants, and Deanna is just being carried around by grown-ups making decisions without her. I don’t know how anyone believed this was mature storytelling.
I disagree, however, that they’re not trying to advance or explore SF tropes. The Tarellians, as people of the diaspora, are familiar to both history and fiction. But the episode isn’t really invested in them except to be magic plot bunnies to get Deanna out of her marriage. Why isn’t the focus of the episode on how to cure them? Instead, Picard and the bridge crew have a meeting about which way they should let them die. Really?
@ 10 sps49
All the Lwaxana hate! I can’t believe it. I love Mr. Hohm, too.
@ 11 ShameAndFailure
No writing training here, beyond the usual liberal arts education and lots of media consumption. Anyone can be a critic on the internet. :)
On the Riker growth issue, it really, really bothers me that Troi claims she ended their relationship because it was incompatible with his being a starship captain. Why on earth would that be the case in this time period? Though now that I think about it, the only captain we ever see in a long-term romantic relationship is Sisko (who doesn’t get to be a captain for while, either). This has always struck me as a huge mistake on the show’s part, and further proof that the writers a) had no clue what to do with women in this world and b) were deeply uncomfortable with stories involving sexuality.
I laughed out loud at Yar’s hair.
@ 13 Ludon
Despite our differences and strong feelings one way or another towards DS9, every single person in our little viewing group would go “MORN!” every time he popped up. Who couldn’t love Morn? Mr. Hohm is wonderful in exactly the same way, you’re right.
Now that you mention it, I still don’t understand their telepathic bonding. Why did that happen? Is it just magic? Is any explanation offered at all?
@ 14 Eugene
The desert makes sense. He’s being emo. Only the desert is appropriate to his level of WOE.
It’s funny, I had all the same reactions as you to the holodeck scene. “Why can Troi walk into his holo program? Well, okay, maybe she has special dispensation since they’re ‘friends’… Wait why can WYATT walk into Riker’s program?! That has to be broken. And now Riker’s leaving… and they’re making out in his program. WHAT.”
All of a sudden, a number of the astute comments above prompt a vision of a Deanna Troi who would have been an interesting, useful character, I daresay.
She would have been more culturally conservative than her parents. I can easily see how a half-Betazoid child might have rebelled against both her father’s outsider status and her mother’s breezy, cynical attitude toward Betazoid traditions into a strong, inflexible assertion of Betazoid identity.
She would also be an ill fit in Starfleet. Permit me to suggest that someone like Troi would never really fit in; she would be regarded as a tool, a useful resource, given perhaps an officer’s commission as a sop but never one of the family. She would, of course, be highly sensitive to this attitude. Because of her cultural conservatism she might also not think too highly of Starfleet’s supposedly inclusive ideas, thinking them based on hypocrisy and repression of true motives.
A particular idea: I can easily see this version of Troi being uncomfortable with Worf. He gets by on a largely human vessel largely by self-discipline and keeping a tight grip on himself when he’d probably rather be a bit rougher and more impulsive, and even the canonical Troi seemms to look dimly on people who were too self-controlled and mannered (e.g. nanites episode). It would give her eventual bond with Worf more depth and conviction if it had started with mistrust. As it actually plays out it’s kind of unmotivated and soap-operatic.
Her fling with Riker would represent to her, later in life, a regrettable lapse. She permitted herself to forget her traditionalism and fall deeply in love with a decidedly un-Betazoid man, and I can see her wanting to run away from that eventually on any sort of pretext. Like, say, claiming it would have been incompatible with Riker’s career goals even though it wasn’t really true.
I also still think it would have been interesting to see at least one story in which Troi’s empathic ability and faith in a particular view of how people should behave–her belief in dragging hidden feelings out into the open, her suspicion of professional facades–leads to a fiasco when she gives bad advice to Picard during some negotiation or crisis.
@16 etomlins
Interesting analysis.
At the very least I would assume a character like Deanna Troi, respectful of her own powers, would incubate her senses of people’s emotional response as prejudicial against them. If she believes she has the infallible power to sense people’s inner selves, why would she not also believe she is fit to judge them and act based on that power? Would anyone be so foolish as to ignore one’s senses and impulses and “insider knowledge” of another?
If we smelled a bad perfume, why would we go about acting as it it was sweet?
Failing that, she would be utterly skeptical of her own powers and the undeniable invasion of privacy they represent. After all, if she is not a believer in the accuracy or potency or utility of her powers, why choose a career where you’d advise anyone on a course of action based on them?
Probably a Betazed, more than any other person, would have internalized, even institutionalized the uncomfortable consequences of this power. I agree, the whole culture would be conservative… and arrogantly cavalier.
This discussion has led me back to something I said in an earlier discussion about Deanna. What I said then would explain the fact that she and her mother seem to be always arguing. If most Betazoids are either empathic or fully telepathic, then lies would be pointless among themselves – even the little things we Humans often say to try to avoid arguments or hurt feelings – would be pointless to them.
As I said in that earlier discussion, the Kelgian species in James White’s Sector General series were (large) caterpillar like beings whose fur rippled according to their emotive state. Since Kelgians couldn’t control this rippling, and any statement not in agreement with the pattern of ripples would be detected as a lie by other Kelgians, they have a strong cultural imprinting to always tell the truth – even when that truth seems tactless or even brutal. (One of the ward nurses is a Kelgian and she will not ‘sugar-coat’ her responses to patient’s questions.) Could it be that someone involved thought things through and reached the same conclusions about Betazoids? Or, did they just borrow the idea from James White?
And Lwaxana’s nature toward everyone else? Maybe dealing with other species doesn’t really come easy for her (knowing that they can’t read her the way she can read them) and this is her way of dealing with those situations. There were moments throughout the series when she seemed to reach a state of ease with the person or people she’s with and she seemed to drop that act. While I do like her character, those were her moments that I really appreciated.
@18 Ludon
The difficulty is, telepathy works about as consistently in the ST universe as transporters and tractor beams. In other words, lots of hand waving and inconsistency in pursuit of whatever the Writers wanted to do that Week.
Total telepaths might have a terribly ethical society based on their inability to mask duplicity from one another. Or it might be they have all kinds of shields and defense mechanisms that have evolved in tandem with their powers and senses, in the same way we’re able to train ourselves to be poker-faced and stoic in our own interpersonal relationships. In other words, they may be able to shield and hide themselves from one another in sophisticated ways. Their “conversations” may be as designed and deliberate as our own.
And perhaps there are societal taboos about not “going there,” probing about someone’s mind, in the same way someone might turn away when they’ve accidentally spotted another person in a state of undress—voluntary acts of common decency.
But whatever biological and cultural defenses Betazoids have built up to make their society workable, what is certain in that the non-telepaths they encounter will *not* have built up these defenses. And so these people would be open to them.
I think it says something inescapable that Betazoids would be sought by Starfleet as xenologists, and would allow themselves to be employed as xenologists. That is, there’s no widespread perception of ethical violation in using these gifts as the ultimate invasion of privacy and to clandestinely eavesdrop on information in the form of a “warrantless wiretap.”
True, they do deal with this ethic tangentially in a later episode (“The Drumhead”), but only in a superficial way that is AFAIK not picked up again. And it is interesting there that it is Picard who perceives and comments on the ethical dilemma, not his ship’s counselor who crosses that ethical bound routinely.
The espoide The Price (i think it was) hits on that moral dilemma. I believe one of the negotiators was a telepath which forced troi into a morale issue regarding her powers.
@18 Ludon: While I’d like to think that there might have been a Sector General influence in the writing, I think it more likely that it was just part of the process of parting out all of Spock’s traits among the cast.