Objectivisme et bolchevisme, nazisme et Satan

[Ronnie Hayek]

Je suis navré, mais tu confonds subjectivité de la valeur (qui concerne uniquement les échanges économiques) et la question des valeurs au sens éthique du terme. Ce qui explique que tu ne comprennes pas mes réponses, à mon avis.

[Invité jabial]

Bon, j'ai dû prêter mon AS. Je vais voir si je peux en trouver un sur eMule, sinon au pire je le rachèterai.

[Invité jabial]

Et voici donc le texte complet de l'accident de train :

Kip Chalmers swore as the train lurched and spilled his cocktail over the table top. He slumped forward, his elbow in the puddle, and said: "God damn these railroads! What's the matter with their track?

You'd think with all the money they've got they'd disgorge a little, so we wouldn't have to bump like farmers on a hay cart!"

His three companions did not take the trouble to answer. It was late, and they remained in the lounge merely because an effort was needed to retire to their compartments. The lights of the lounge looked like feeble portholes in a fog of cigarette smoke dank with the odor of alcohol. It was a private car, which Chalmers had demanded and obtained for his journey; it was attached to the end of the Comet and it swung like the tail of a nervous animal as the Comet coiled through the curves of the mountains.

"I'm going to campaign for the nationalization of the railroads,"

said Kip Chalmers, glaring defiantly at a small, gray man who looked at him without interest. 'That's going to be my platform plank. I've got to have a platform plank. I don't like Jim Taggart. He looks like a soft-boiled clam. To hell with the railroads! It's time we took them over."

"Go to bed," said the man, "if you expect to look like anything human at the big rally tomorrow."

"Do you think we'll make it?"

"You've got to make it."

"I know I've got to. But I don't think we'll get there on time. This goddamn snail of a super-special is hours late."

"You’ve got to get there, Kip," said the man ominously, in that stubborn monotone of the unthinking which asserts an end without concern for the means.

"God damn you, don't you suppose I know it?"

Kip Chalmers had curly blond hair and a shapeless mouth. He came from a semi-wealthy, semi-distinguished family, but he sneered at wealth and distinction in a manner which implied that only a top rank aristocrat could permit himself such a degree of cynical indifference. He had graduated from a college which specialized in breeding that kind of aristocracy. The college had taught him that the purpose of ideas is to fool those who are stupid enough to think. He had made his way in Washington with the grace of a cat-burglar, climbing from bureau to bureau as from ledge to ledge of a crumbling structure. He was ranked as semi-powerful, but his manner made laymen mistake him for nothing less than Wesley Mouch.

For reasons of his own particular strategy, Kip Chalmers had decided to enter popular politics and to run for election as Legislator from California, though he knew nothing about that state except the movie industry and the beach clubs. His campaign manager had done the preliminary work, and Chalmers was now on his way to face his future constituents for the first time at an over publicized rally in San Francisco tomorrow night. The manager had wanted him to start a day earlier, but Charmers had stayed in Washington to attend a cocktail party and had taken the last train possible. He had shown no concern about the rally until this evening, when he noticed that the Comet was running six hours late.

His three companions did not mind his mood: they liked his liquor, tester Tuck, his campaign manager, was a small, aging man with a face that looked as if it had once been punched in and had never rebounded. He was an attorney who, some generations earlier, would have represented shoplifters and people who stage accidents on the premises of rich corporations; now he found that he could do better by representing men like Kip Chalmers.

Laura Bradford was Chalmers' current mistress; he liked her because his predecessor had been Wesley Mouch. She was a movie actress who had forced her way from competent featured player to incompetent star, not by means of sleeping with studio executives, but by taking the long-distance short cut of sleeping with bureaucrats. She talked economics, instead of glamor, for press interviews, in the belligerently righteous style of a third-rate tabloid; her economics consisted of the assertion that "we've got to help the poor."

Gilbert Keith-Worthing was Chalmers' guest, for no reason that either of them could discover. He was a British novelist of world fame, who had been popular thirty years ago; since then, nobody bothered to read what he wrote, but everybody accepted him as a walking classic.

He had been considered profound for uttering such things as: "Freedom? Do let's stop talking about freedom. Freedom is impossible. Man can never be free of hunger, of cold, of disease, of physical accidents.

He can never be free of the tyranny of nature. So why should he object to the tyranny of a political dictatorship?" When all of Europe put into practice the ideas which he bad preached, he came to live in America. Through the years, his style of writing and his body had grown flabby. At seventy, he was an obese old man with retouched hair and a manner of scornful cynicism retouched by quotations from the yogis about the futility of all human endeavor. Kip Chalmers had invited him, because it seemed to look distinguished. Gilbert Keith Worthing had come along, because he had no particular place to go.

"God damn these railroad people!" said Kip Chalmers. "They're doing it on purpose. They want to ruin my campaign. I can't miss that rally! For Christ's sake, Lester, do something!"

"I've tried," said Lester Tuck. At the train's last stop, he had tried, by long-distance telephone, to find air transportation to complete their journey; but there were no commercial flights scheduled for the next two days.

"If they don't get me there on time, I'll have their scalps and their railroad! Can't we tell that damn conductor to hurry?"

"You've told him three times,"

"I'll get him fired. He's given me nothing but a lot of alibis about all their messy technical troubles. I expect transportation, not alibis. They can't treat me like one of their day-coach passengers. I expect them to get me where I want to go when I want it. Don't they know that I'm on this train?"

"They know it by now," said Laura Bradford. "Shut up, Kip. You bore me."

Chalmers refilled his glass. The car was rocking and the glassware tinkled faintly on the shelves of the bar. The patches of starlit sky in the windows kept swaying jerkily, and it seemed as if the stars were tinkling against one another. They could see nothing beyond the glass bay of the observation window at the end of the car, except the small halos of red and green lanterns marking the rear of the train, and a brief stretch of rail running away from them into the darkness. A wall of rock was racing the train, and the stars dipped occasionally into a sudden break that outlined, high above them, the peaks of the mountains of Colorado.

"Mountains . . ." said Gilbert Keith-Worthing, with satisfaction.

"It is a spectacle of this kind that makes one feel the insignificance of man.' What is this presumptuous little bit of rail, which crude materialists are so proud of building—compared to that eternal grandeur? No more than the basting thread of a seamstress on the hem of the garment of nature. If a single one of those granite giants chose to crumble, it would annihilate this train."

"Why should it choose to crumble?" asked Laura Bradford, without any particular interest.

"I think this damn train is going slower," said Kip Chalmers. "Those bastards are slowing down,, in spite of what I told them!"

"Well . . . it's the mountains, you know . . ." said Lester Tuck.

"Mountains be damned! Lester, what day is this? With all those damn changes of time, I can't tell which—"

"It's May twenty-seventh," sighed Lester Tuck.

"It's May twenty-eighth," said Gilbert Keith-Worthing, glancing at his watch. "It is now twelve minutes past midnight.”

"Jesus!" cried Chalmers. "Then the rally is today?"

"Yep," said Lester Tuck.

"We won't make it! We—"

The train gave a sharper lurch, knocking the glass out of his hand.

The thin sound of its crash against the floor mixed with the screech of the wheel-flanges tearing against the rail of a sharp curve.

"I say," asked Gilbert Keith-Worthing nervously, "are your railroads safe?"

"Hell, yes!" said Kip Chalmers. "We've got so many rules, regulations and controls that those bastards wouldn't dare not to be safe!

. . . Lester, how far are we now? What's the next stop?'1

"There won't be any stop till Salt Lake City."

"I mean, what's the next station?"

Lester Tuck produced a soiled map, which he had been consulting every few minutes since nightfall. "Winston," he said. "Winston, Colorado."

Kip Chalmers reached for another glass.

"Tinky Holloway said that Wesley said that if you don't win this election, you're through," said Laura Bradford. She sat sprawled in her chair, looking past Chalmers, studying her own face in a mirror on the wall of the lounge; she was bored and it amused her to needle his impotent anger.

"Oh, he did, did he?"

"Uh-huh. Wesley doesn't want what's-his-name—whoever's running against you—to get into the Legislature. If you don't win, Wesley will be sore as hell. Tinky said—"

"Damn that bastard! He'd better watch his own neck!"

"Oh, I don't know. Wesley likes him very much." She added, "Tinky Holloway wouldn't allow some miserable train to make him miss an important meeting. They wouldn't dare to hold him up."

Kip Chalmers sat staring at his glass. "I'm going to have the government seize all the railroads," he said, his voice low.

"Really," said Gilbert Keith-Worthing, "I don't see why you haven't done it long ago. This is the only country on earth backward enough to permit private ownership of railroads."

"Well, we're catching up with you," said Kip Chalmers.

"Your country is so incredibly naive. It's such an anachronism. All that talk about liberty and human rights—I haven't heard it since the days of my great-grandfather. It's nothing but a verbal luxury of the rich. After all, it doesn't make any difference to the poor whether their livelihood is at the mercy of an industrialist or of a bureaucrat."

5S8

"The day of the industrialists is over. This is the day of—"

The jolt felt as if the air within the car smashed them forward while the floor stopped under their feet. Kip Chalmers was flung down to the carpet, Gilbert Keith-Worthing was thrown across the table top, the lights were blasted out. Glasses crashed off the shelves, the steel of the walls screamed as if about to rip open, while a long, distant thud went like a convulsion through the wheels of the train.

When he raised his head, Chalmers saw that the car stood intact and still; he heard the moans of his companions and the first shriek of Laura Bradford's

hysterics. He crawled along the floor to the doorway, wrenched it open, and tumbled down the steps. Far ahead, on the side of a curve, he saw moving flashlights and a red glow at a spot where the engine had no place to be. He stumbled through the darkness, bumping into half-clothed figures that waved the futile little flares of matches.

Somewhere along the line, he saw a man with a flashlight and seized his arm. It was the conductor.

"What happened?" gasped Chalmers.

"Split rail,” the conductor answered impassively. "The engine went off the track."

"Off . . . ?M

"On its side."

"Anybody . . . killed?"

"No. The engineer's all right. The fireman is hurt."

"Split rail? What do you mean, split rail?"

The conductor's face had an odd look: it was grim, accusing and closed. "Rail wears out, Mr. Chalmers," he answered with a strange kind of emphasis. "Particularly on curves."

"Didn't you know that it was worn out?"

"We knew."

"Well, why didn't you have it replaced?"

"It was going to be replaced. But Mr. Locey cancelled that."

"Who is Mr. Locey?"

"The man who is not our Operating Vice-President."

Chalmers wondered why the conductor seemed to look at him as if something about the catastrophe were his fault. "Well . . . well, aren't you going to put the engine back on the track?"

"That engine's never going to be put back on any track, from the looks of it."

"But . . . but it's got to move us!"

"It can't."

Beyond the few moving flares and the dulled sounds of screams, Chalmers sensed suddenly, not wanting to look at it, the black immensity of the mountains, the silence of hundreds of uninhabited miles, and the precarious strip of a ledge hanging between a wall of rock and an abyss. He gripped the conductor's arm tighter.

"But . . . but what are we going to do?"

"The engineer's gone to call Winston."

"Call? How?"

"There's a phone couple of miles down the track."

"Will they get us out of here?"

"They will."

"But . . ." Then his mind made a connection with the past and the future, and his voice rose to a scream for the first time: "How long will we have to wait?"

"I don't know," said the conductor. He threw Chalmers' hand off his arm, and walked away.

The night operator of Winston Station listened to the phone message, dropped the receiver and raced up the stairs to shake the station agent out of bed. The station agent was a husky, surly drifter who had been assigned to the job ten days ago, by order of the new division superintendent. He stumbled dazedly to his feet, but he was knocked awake when the operator's words reached his brain.

"What?" he gasped. "Jesus! The Comet? . . . Well, don't stand there shaking! Call Silver Springs!"

The night dispatcher of the Division Headquarters at Silver Springs listened to the message, then telephoned Dave Mitchum, the new superintendent of the Colorado Division.

"The Comet?" gasped Mitchum, his hand pressing the telephone receiver to his ear, his feet hitting the floor and throwing him upright, out of bed. "The engine done for? The Diesel?"

"Yes, sir."

"Oh God! Oh, God Almighty! What are we going to do?" Then, remembering his position, he added, "Well, send out the wrecking train."

"I have."

"Call the operator at Sherwood to hold all traffic."

"I have."

"What have you got on the sheet?"

"The Army Freight Special, westbound. But it's not due for about four hours. It's running late."

"I'll be right down. . . . Wait, listen, get Bill, Sandy and Clarence down by the time I get there. There's going to be hell to pay!"

Dave Mitchum had always complained about injustice, because, he said, he had always had bad luck. He explained it by speaking darkly about the conspiracy of the big fellows, who would never give him a chance, though he did not explain just whom he meant by "the big fellows." Seniority of service was his favorite topic of complaint and sole standard of value; he had been in the railroad business longer than many men who had advanced beyond him; this, he said, was proof of the social system's injustice—though he never explained just what he meant by "the social system." He had worked for many railroads, but had not stayed long with any one of them. His employers had had no specific misdeeds to charge against him, but had simply eased him out, because he said, "Nobody told me to!” too often. He did not know that he owed his present job to a deal between James Taggart and Wesley Mouch: when Taggart traded to Mouch the secret of his sister's private life, in exchange for a raise in rates, Mouch made him throw in an extra favor, by their customary rules of bargaining, which consisted of squeezing all one could out of any given trade. The extra was a job for Dave Mitchum, who was the brother-in-law of Claude Slagenhop, who was the president of the Friends of Global Progress, who were regarded by Mouch as a valuable influence on public opinion. James Taggart pushed the responsibility of finding a job for Mitchum onto Clifton Locey. Locey pushed Mitchum into the first job that came up—superintendent of the Colorado Division—when the man holding it quit without notice. The man quit when the extra Diesel engine of Winston Station was given to Chick Morrison's Special.

"What are we going to do?" cried Dave Mitchum, rushing, half-dressed and groggy with sleep, into his office, where the chief dispatcher, the trainmaster and the road foreman of engines were waiting for him.

The three men did not answer. They were middle-aged men with years of railroad service behind them. A month ago, they would have volunteered their advice in any emergency; but they were beginning to learn that things had changed and that it was dangerous to speak.

"What in hell are we going to do?"

"One thing is certain," said Bill Brent, the chief dispatcher. "We can't send a train into the tunnel with a coal-burning engine."

Dave Mitchum's eyes grew sullen: he knew that this was the one thought on all their minds; he wished Brent had not named it.

"Well, where do we get a Diesel?" he asked angrily.

"We don't," said the road foreman.

"But we can't keep the Comet waiting on a siding all night!"

"Looks like we'll have to," said the trainmaster. "What's the use of talking about it, Dave? You know that there is no Diesel anywhere on the division."

"But Christ Almighty, how do they expect us to move trains without engines?"

"Miss Taggart didn't," said the road foreman. "Mr. Locey does."

"Bill," asked Mitchum, in the tone of pleading for a favor, "isn't there anything transcontinental that's due tonight, with any sort of a Diesel?"

"The first one to come," said Bill Brent implacably, "will be Number 236, the fast freight from San Francisco, which is due at Winston at seven-eighteen A.M." He added, "That's the Diesel closest to us at this moment. I've checked,"

"What about the Army Special?"

"Better not think about it, Dave. That one has superiority over everything on the line, including the Comet, by order of the Army.

They're running late as it is—journal boxes caught fire twice. They're carrying munitions for the West Coast arsenals. Better pray that nothing stops them on your division. If you think we'll catch hell for holding the Comet, it's nothing to what we'll catch if we try to stop that Special."

They remained silent. The windows were open to the summer night and they could hear the ringing of the telephone in the dispatcher's office downstairs. The signal lights winked over the deserted yards that had once been a busy division point.

Mitchum looked toward the roundhouse, where the black silhouettes of a few steam engines stood outlined in a dim light.

"The tunnel—" he said and stopped.

"—is eight miles long," said the trainmaster, with a harsh emphasis.

"I was only thinking," snapped Mitchum.

"Better not think of it," said Brent softly.

"I haven't said anything!"

"What was that talk you had with Dick Horton before he quit?" the road foreman asked too innocently, as if the subject were irrelevant.

"Wasn't it something about the ventilation system of the tunnel being on the bum? Didn't he say that that tunnel was hardly safe nowadays even for Diesel engines?"

"Why do you bring that up?" snapped Mitchum. "I haven't said anything!" Dick Horton, the division chief engineer, had quit three days after Mitchum's arrival.

"I thought I'd just mention it," the road foreman answered innocently.

"Look, Dave," said Bill Brent, knowing that Mitchum would stall for another hour rather than formulate a decision, "you know that there's only one thing to do: hold the Comet at Winston till morning, wait for Number 236, have her Diesel take the Comet through the tunnel, then let the Comet finish her run with the best coal-burner we can give her on the other side,"

"But how late will that make her?"

Brent shrugged. "Twelve hours—eighteen hours—who knows?"

"Eighteen hours—for the Comet? Christ, that's never happened before!"

"None of what's been happening to us has ever happened before,"

said Brent, with an astonishing sound of weariness in his brisk, competent voice.

"But they'll blame us for it in New York! They'll put all the blame on us!"

Brent shrugged. A month ago, he would have considered such an injustice inconceivable; today, he knew better.

"I guess . . ." said Mitchum miserably, "I guess there's nothing else that we can do."

"There isn't, Dave,"

"Oh God! Why did this have to happen to us?"

"Who is John Galt?"

It was half-past two when the Comet, pulled by an old switch engine, jerked to a stop on a siding of Winston Station. Kip Chalmers glanced out with incredulous anger at the few shanties on a desolate mountainside and at the ancient hovel of a station.

"Now what? What in hell are they stopping here for?" he cried, and rang for the conductor.

With the return of motion and safety, his terror had turned into rage. He felt almost as if he had been cheated by having been made to experience an unnecessary fear. His companions were still clinging to the tables of the lounge; they felt too shaken to sleep.

"How long?" the conductor said impassively, in answer to his question. "Till morning, Mr. Chalmers."

Chalmers stared at him, stupefied. "We're going to stand here till morning?"

"Yes, Mr. Chalmers."

"Here?"

"Yes."

"But I have a rally in San Francisco in the evening!"

The conductor did not answer.

"Why? Why do we have to stand? Why in hell? What happened?"

Slowly, patiently, with contemptuous politeness, the conductor gave him an exact account of the situation. But years ago, in grammar school, in high school, in college, Kip Chalmers had been taught that man does not and need not live by reason.

"Damn your tunnel!" he screamed. "Do you think I'm going to let you hold me up because of some miserable tunnel? Do you want to wreck vital national plans on account of a tunnel? Tell your engineer that I must be in San Francisco by evening and that he's got to get me there!"

"How?"

"That's your job, not mine!"

"There is no way to do it."

"Then find a way, God damn you!"

The conductor did not answer.

"Do you think I'll let your miserable technological problems interfere with crucial social issues? Do you know who I am? Tell that engineer to start moving, if he values his job!"

"The engineer has his orders."

"Orders be damned! I give the orders these days! Tell him to start at once!"

"Perhaps you'd better speak to the station agent, Mr. Chalmers. I have no authority to answer you as I'd like to," said the conductor, and walked out.

Chalmers leaped to his feet. "Say, Kip . . ." said Lester Tuck uneasily, "maybe it's true . . . maybe they can't do it."

"They can if they have to!" snapped Chalmers, marching resolutely to the door.

Years ago, in college, he had been taught that the only effective means to impel men to action was fear.

In the dilapidated office of Winston Station, he confronted a sleepy man with slack, worn features, and a frightened young boy who sat at the operator's desk. They listened, in silent stupor, to a stream of profanity such as they had never heard from any section gang.

"—and it's not my problem how you get the train through the tunnel, that's for you to figure out!" Chalmers concluded. "But if you don't get me an engine and don't start that train, you can kiss good-bye to your jobs, your work permits and this whole goddamn railroad!"

The station agent had never heard of Kip Chalmers and did not know the nature of his position. But he knew that this was the day when unknown men in undefined positions held unlimited power—the power of life or death.

"It's not up to us, Mr. Chalmers," he said pleadingly. "We don't issue the orders out here. The order came from Silver Springs. Suppose you telephone Mr. Mitchum and—"

"Who's Mr. Mitchum?"

"He's the division superintendent at Silver Springs. Suppose you send him a message to—"

"I should bother with a division superintendent! I'll send a message to Jim Taggart—that's what I'm going to do!"

Before the station agent had time to recover, Chalmers whirled to the boy, ordering, "You—take this down and send it at once!"

It was a message which, a month ago, the station agent would not have accepted from any passenger; the rules forbade it; but he was not certain about any rules any longer: Mr. James Taggart, New York City. Am held up on the Comet at Winston, Colorado, by the incompetence of your men, who refuse to give me an engine. Have meeting in San Francisco in the evening of top-level national importance. If you don't move my train at once, I'll let you guess the consequences. Kip Chalmers.

After the boy had transmitted the words onto the wires that stretched from pole to pole across a continent as guardians of the Taggart track—after Kip Chalmers had returned to Ms car to wait for an answer—the station agent telephoned Dave Mitchum, who was his friend, and read to him the text of the message. He heard Mitchum groan in answer.

"I thought I'd tell you, Dave. I never heard of the guy before, but maybe he's somebody important."

"I don't know!" moaned Mitchum. "Kip Chalmers? You see his name in the newspapers all the time, right in with all the top-level boys, I don't know what he is, but if he's from Washington, we can't take any chances. Oh Christ, what are we going to do?"

We can't take any chances—thought the Taggart operator in New York, and transmitted the message by telephone to James Taggart's home. It was close to six A.M. in New York, and James Taggart was awakened out of the fitful sleep of a restless night. He listened to the telephone, his face sagging. He felt the same fear as the station agent of Winston, and for the same reason.

He called the home of Clifton Locey. All the rage which he could not pour upon Kip Chalmers, was poured over the telephone wire upon Clifton Locey. "Do something!" screamed Taggart. "I don't care what you do, it's your job, not mine, but see to it that that train gets through! What in hell is going on? I never heard of the Comet being held up! Is that how you run your department? It's a fine thing when important passengers have to start sending messages to me! At least, when my sister ran the place, I wasn't awakened in the middle of the night over every spike that broke in Iowa—Colorado, I mean!"

"I'm so sorry, Jim," said Clifton Locey smoothly, in a tone that balanced apology, reassurance and the right degree of patronizing confidence. "It's just a misunderstanding. It's somebody's stupid mistake.

Don't worry, 111 take care of it. I was, as a matter of fact, in bed, but I'll attend to it at once."

Clifton Locey was not in bed; he had just returned from a round of night clubs, in the company of a young lady. He asked her to wait and hurried to the offices of Taggart Transcontinental. None of the night staff who saw him there could say why he chose to appear in person, but neither could they say that it had been unnecessary. He rushed in and out of several offices, was seen by many people and gave an impression of great activity. The only physical result of it was an order that went over the wires to Dave Mitchum, superintendent of the Colorado Division: "Give an engine to Mr. Chalmers at

once. Send the Comet through safely and without unnecessary delay. If you are unable to perform your duties, I shall hold you responsible before the Unification Board, Clifton Locey,"

Then, calling his girl friend to join him, Clifton Locey drove to a country roadhouse—to make certain that no one would be able to find him in the next few hours.

The dispatcher at Silver Springs was baffled by the order that he handed to Dave Mitchum, but Dave Mitchum understood. He knew that no railroad order would ever speak in such terms as giving an engine to a passenger; he knew that the thing was a show piece, he guessed what sort of show was being staged, and he felt a cold sweat at the realization of who was being framed as the goat of the show.

"What's the matter, Dave?" asked the trainmaster.

Mitchum did not answer. He seized the telephone, his hands shaking as he begged for a connection to the Taggart operator in New York, He looked like an animal in a trap.

He begged the New York operator to get him Mr. Clifton Locey's home. The operator tried. There was no answer. He begged the operator to keep on trying and to try every number he could think of, where Mr. Locey might be found. The operator promised and Mitchum hung up, but knew that it was useless to wait or to speak to anyone in Mr. Locey's department.

"What's the matter, Dave?"

Mitchum handed him the order—and saw by the look on the trainmaster's face that the trap was as bad as he had suspected.

He called the Region Headquarters of Taggart Transcontinental at Omaha, Nebraska, and begged to speak to the general manager of the region. There was a brief silence on the wire, then the voice of the Omaha operator told him that the general manager had resigned and vanished three days ago—"over a little trouble with Mr. Locey," the voice added.

He asked to speak to the assistant general manager in charge of his particular district; but the assistant was out of town for the week end and could not be reached.

"Get me somebody else!" Mitchum screamed. "Anybody, of any district! For Christ's sake, get me somebody who'll tell me what to do!"

The man who came on the wire was the assistant general manager of the Iowa-Minnesota District.

"What?" he interrupted at Mitchum's first words. "At Winston, Colorado? Why in hell are you calling me? . . . No, don't tell me what happened, I don't want to know it! . . . No, I said! No! You're not going to frame me into having to explain afterwards why I did or didn't do anything about whatever it is. It's not my problem! . . . Speak to some region executive, don't pick on me, what do I have to do with Colorado? . . . Oh hell, I don't know, get the chief engineer, speak to him!"

The chief engineer of the Central Region answered impatiently, "Yes? What? What is it?"—and Mitchum rushed desperately to explain. When the chief engineer heard that there was no Diesel, he snapped, "Then hold the train, of course!" When he heard about Mr.

Chalmers, he said, his voice suddenly subdued, "Hm . . . Kip Chalmers? Of Washington? . . . Well, I don't know. That would be a matter for Mr. Locey to decide." When Mitchum said, "Mr. Locey ordered me to arrange it, but—" the chief engineer snapped in great relief, "Then do exactly as Mr. Locey says!" and hung up.

Dave Mitchum replaced the telephone receiver cautiously. He did not scream any longer. Instead, he-tiptoed to a chair, almost as if he were sneaking. He sat looking at Mr. Locey's order for a long time.

Then he snatched a glance about the room. The dispatcher was busy at his telephone. The trainmaster and the road foreman were there, but they

pretended that they were not waiting. He wished Bill Brent, the chief dispatcher, would go home; Bill Brent stood in a corner, watching him.

Brent was a short, thin man with broad shoulders; he was forty, but looked younger; he had the pale face of an office worker and the hard, lean features of a cowboy. He was the best dispatcher on the system.

Mitchum rose abruptly and walked upstairs to his office, clutching Locey's order in his hand.

Dave Mitchum was not good at understanding problems of engineering and transportation, but he understood men like Clifton Locey. He understood the kind of game the New York executives were playing and what they were now doing to him. The order did not tell him to give Mr. Chalmers a coal-burning engine—just "an engine." If the time came to answer questions, wouldn't Mr. Locey gasp in shocked indignation that he had expected a division superintendent to know that only a Diesel engine could be meant in that order? The order stated that he was to send the Comet through "safely"—wasn't a division superintendent expected to know what was safe?—"and without unnecessary delay." What was an unnecessary delay? If the possibility of a major disaster was involved, wouldn't a delay of a week or a month be considered necessary?

The New York executives did not care, thought Mitchum; they did not care whether Mr. Chalmers reached his meeting on time, or whether an unprecedented catastrophe struck their rails; they cared only about making sure that they would not be blamed for either. If he held the train, they would make him the scapegoat to appease the anger of Mr. Chalmers; if he sent the train through and it did not reach the western portal of the tunnel, they would put the blame on his incompetence; they would claim that he had acted against their orders, in either case. What would he be able to prove? To whom? One could prove nothing to a tribunal that had no stated policy, no defined procedure, no rules of evidence, no binding principles—a tribunal, such as the Unification Board, that pronounced men guilty or innocent as it saw fit, with no standard of guilt or innocence.

Dave Mitchum knew nothing about the philosophy of law; but he knew that when a court is not bound by any rules, it is not bound by any facts, and then a hearing is not an issue of justice, but an issue of men, and your fate depends not on what you have or have not done, but on whom you do or do not know. He asked himself what chance he would have at such a hearing against Mr. James Taggart, Mr. Clifton Locey, Mr. Kip Chalmers and their powerful friends.

Dave Mitchum had spent his life slipping around the necessity of ever making a decision; he had done it by waiting to be told and never being certain of anything. All that he now allowed into his brain was a long, indignant whine against injustice. Fate, he thought, had singled him out for an unfair amount of bad luck: he was being framed by his superiors on the only good job he had ever held. He had never been taught to understand that the manner in which he obtained this job, and the frame-up, were inextricable parts of a single whole.

As he looked at Locey's order, he thought that he could hold the Comet, attach Mr. Chalmers1 car to an engine and send it into the tunnel, alone. But he shook his head before the thought was fully formed: he knew that this would force Mr. Chalmers to recognize the nature of the risk; Mr. Chalmers would refuse; he would continue to demand a safe and non-existent engine. And more: this would mean that he, Mitchum, would have to assume responsibility, admit full knowledge of the danger, stand in the open and identify the exact nature of the situation—the one act which the policy of his superiors was based on evading, the one key to their game.

Dave Mitchum was not the man to rebel against his background or to question the moral code of those in charge. The choice he made was not to

challenge, but to follow the policy of his superiors. Bill Brent could have- beaten him in any contest of technology, but here was an endeavor at which he could beat Bill Brent without effort. There had once been a society where men needed the particular talents of Bill Brent, if they wished to survive; what they needed now was the talent of Dave Mitchum.

Dave Mitchum sat down at his secretary's typewriter and, by means of two fingers, carefully typed out an order to the trainmaster and another to the road foreman. The first instructed the trainmaster to summon a locomotive crew at once, for a purpose described only as "an emergency"; the second instructed the road foreman to "send the best engine available to Winston, to stand by for emergency assistance."

He put carbon copies of the orders into his own pocket, then opened the door, yelled for the night dispatcher to come up and handed him the two orders for the two men downstairs. The night dispatcher was a conscientious young boy who trusted his superiors and knew that discipline was the first rule of the railroad business. He was astonished that Mitchum should wish to send written orders down one flight of stairs, but he asked no questions, Mitchum waited nervously. After a while, he saw the figure of the road foreman walking across the yards toward the roundhouse. He felt relieved: the two men had not come up to confront him in person; they had understood and they would play the game as he was playing it.

The road foreman walked across the yards, looking down at the ground. He was thinking of his wife, his two children and the house which he had spent a lifetime to own. He knew what his superiors were doing and he wondered whether he should refuse to obey them. He had never been afraid of losing his job; with the confidence of a competent man, he had known that if he quarreled with one employer, he would always be able to find another. Now, he was afraid; he had no right to quit or to seek a job; if he defied an employer, he would be delivered into the unanswerable power of a single Board, and if the Board ruled against him, it would mean being sentenced to the slow death of starvation: it would mean being barred from any employment. He knew that the Board would rule against him; he knew that the key to the dark, capricious mystery of the Board's contradictory decisions was the secret power of pull. What chance would he have against Mr. Chalmers? There had been a time when the self-interest of his employers had demanded that he exercise his utmost ability.

Now, ability was not wanted any longer. There had been a time when he had been required to do his best and rewarded accordingly. Now, he could expect nothing but punishment, if he tried to follow his conscience. There had been a time when he had been expected to think.

Now, they did not want him to think, only to obey. They did not want him to have a conscience any longer. Then why should he raise his voice? For whose sake? He thought of the passengers—the three hundred passengers aboard the Comet. He thought of his children. He had a son in high school and a daughter, nineteen, of whom he was fiercely, painfully proud, because she was recognized as the most beautiful girl in town. He asked himself whether he could deliver his children to the fate of the children of the unemployed, as he had seen them in the blighted areas, in the settlements around closed factories and along the tracks of discontinued railroads. He saw, in astonished horror, that the choice which he now had to make was between the lives of his children and the lives of the passengers on the Comet. A conflict of this kind had never been possible before. It was by protecting the safety of the passengers that he had earned the security of his children; he had served one by serving the other; there had been no clash of interests, no call for victims. Now, if he wanted to save the passengers, he had to do it at the price of his children.

He remembered dimly the sermons he had heard about the beauty of self-immolation, about the virtue of sacrificing to others that which was one's dearest. He knew nothing about the philosophy of ethics; but he knew suddenly—not in words, but in the form of a dark, angry, savage pain—that if this was virtue, then he wanted no part of it.

He walked into the roundhouse and ordered a large, ancient coal burning locomotive to be made ready for the run to Winston.

The trainmaster reached for the telephone in the dispatcher's office, to summon an engine crew, as ordered. But his hand stopped, holding the receiver. It struck him suddenly that he was summoning men to their death, and that of the twenty lives listed on the sheet before him, two would be ended by his choice. He felt a physical sensation of cold, nothing more; he felt no concern, only a puzzled, indifferent astonishment. It had never been his job to call men out to die; his job had been to call them out to earn their living. It was strange, he thought; and it was strange that his hand had stopped; what made it stop was like something he would have felt twenty years ago—no, he thought, strange, only one month ago, not longer.

He was forty-eight years old. He had no family, no friends, no ties to any living being in the world. Whatever capacity for devotion he had possessed, the capacity which others scatter among many random concerns, he had given it whole to the person of his young brother —the brother, his junior by twenty-five years, whom he had brought up. He had sent him through a technological college, and he had known, as had all the teachers, that the boy had the mark of genius on the forehead of his grim, young face. With the same single-tracked devotion as his brother's, the boy had cared for nothing but his studies, not for sports or parties or girls, only for the vision of the things he was going to create as an inventor. He had graduated from college and had gone, on a salary unusual for his age, into the research laboratory of a great electrical concern in Massachusetts.

This was now May 28, thought the trainmaster. It was on May 1

that Directive 10-289 had been issued. It was on the evening of May I that he had been informed that his brother had committed suicide.

The trainmaster had heard it said that the directive was necessary to save the country. He could not know whether this was true or not; he had no way of knowing what was necessary to save a country. But driven by some feeling which he could not express, he had walked into the office of the editor of the local newspaper and demanded that they publish the story of his brother's death. "People have to know it," had been all he could give as his reason. He had been unable to explain that the bruised connections of his mind had formed the wordless conclusion that if this was done by the will of the people, then the people had to know it; he could not believe that they would do it, if they knew. The editor had refused; he had stated that it would be bad for the country's morale.

The trainmaster knew nothing about political philosophy; but he knew that that had been the moment when he lost all concern for the life or death of any human being or of the country.

He thought, holding the telephone receiver, that maybe he should warn the men whom he was about to call. They trusted him; it would never occur to them that he could knowingly send them to their death.

But he shook his head: this was only an old thought, last year's thought, a remnant of the time when he had trusted them, too. It did not matter now. His brain worked slowly, as if he were dragging his thoughts through a vacuum where no emotion responded to spur them on; he thought that there would be trouble if he warned anyone, there would be some sort of fight and it was he who had to make some great effort to start it. He had forgotten what it was that one started this sort of fight for. Truth? Justice? Brother-love? He did not want to make an effort. He was very tired. If he warned all the men on

his list, he thought, there would be no one to run that engine, so he would save two lives and also three hundred lives aboard the Comet.

But nothing responded to the figures in his mind; "lives" was just a word, it had no meaning.

He raised the telephone receiver to his ear, he called two numbers, he summoned an engineer and a fireman to report for duty at once.

Engine Number 306 had left for Winston, when Dave Mitchum came downstairs. "Get a track motor car ready for me," he ordered, "I'm going to run up to Fairmount." Fairmount was a small station, twenty miles east on the line. The men nodded, asking no questions. Bill Brent was not among them. Mitchum walked into Brent's office. Brent was there, sitting silently at his desk; he seemed to be waiting.

"I'm going to Fairmount," said Mitchum; his voice was aggressively too casual, as if implying that no answer was necessary. "They had a Diesel there couple of weeks ago . . . you know, emergency repairs or something. . . . I'm going down to see if we could use it."

He paused, but Brent said nothing.

"The way things stack up," said Mitchum, not looking at him, "we can't hold that train till morning. We've got to take a chance, one way or another. Now I think maybe this Diesel will do it, but that's the last one we can try for. So if you don't hear from me in half an hour, sign the order and send the Comet through with Number 306 to pull her."

Whatever Brent had thought, he could not believe it when he heard it. He did not answer at once; then he said, very quietly, "No."

"What do you mean, no?"

"I won't do it."

"What do you mean, you won't? It's an order!”

"I won't do it." Brent's voice had the firmness of certainty unclouded by any emotion.

"Are you refusing to obey an order?"

"I am."

"But you have no right to refuse! And I'm not going to argue about it, either. It's what I've decided, it's my responsibility and I'm not asking for your opinion. Your job is to take my orders."

"Will you give me that order in writing?"

"Why, God damn you, are you hinting that you don't trust me? Are you . . . ?"

"Why do you have to go to Fairmount, Dave? Why can't you telephone them about that Diesel, if you think that they have one?"

"You're not going to tell me how to do my job! You're not going to sit there and question me! You're going to keep your trap shut and do as you're told or I'll give you a chance to talk—to the Unification Board!"

It was hard to decipher emotions on Brent's cowboy face, but Mitchum saw something that resembled a look of incredulous horror; only it was horror at some sight of his own, not at the words, and it had no quality of fear, not the kind of fear Mitchum had hoped for.

Brent knew that tomorrow morning the issue would be his word against Mitchum's; Mitchum would deny having given the order; Mitchum would show written proof that Engine Number 306 had been sent to Winston only "to stand by," and would produce witnesses that he had gone to Fairmount in search of a Diesel; Mitchum would claim that the fatal order had been issued by and on the sole responsibility of Bill Brent, the chief dispatcher, it would not be much of a case, not a case that could bear close study, but it would be enough for the Unification Board, whose policy was consistent only in not permitting anything to be studied closely. Brent knew that he could play the same game and pass the frame-up on to another victim, he knew that he had the brains to work it out—except that he would rather be dead than do it.

It was not the sight of Mitchum that made him sit still in horror.

It was the realization that there was no one whom he could call to expose this thing and stop it—no superior anywhere on the line, from Colorado to Omaha to New York. They were in on it, all of them, they were doing the same, they had given Mitchum the lead and the method. It was Dave Mitchum who now belonged on this railroad and he, Bill Brent, who did not.

As Bill Brent had learned to see, by a single glance at a few numbers on a sheet of paper, the entire trackage of a division—so he was now able to see the whole of his own life and the full price of the decision he was making. He had not fallen in love until he was past his youth; he had been thirty-six when he had found the woman he wanted. He had been engaged to her for the last four years; he had had to wait, because he had a mother to support and a widowed sister with three children. He had never been afraid of burdens, because he had known his ability to carry them, and he had never assumed an obligation unless he was certain that he could fulfill it. He had waited, he had saved his money, and now he had reached the time when he felt himself free to be happy. He was to be married in a few weeks, this coming June. He thought of it, as he sat at his desk, looking at Dave Mitchum, but the thought aroused no hesitation, only regret and a distant sadness—distant, because he knew that he could not let it be part of this moment.

Bill Brent knew nothing about epistemology; but he knew that man must live by his own rational perception of reality, that he cannot act against it or escape it or find a substitute for it—and that there is no other way for him to live.

He rose to his feet. "It's true that so long as I hold this job, I cannot refuse to obey you," he said. "But I can, if I quit. So I'm quitting."

"You're what?"

"I'm quitting, as of this moment."

"But you have no right to quit, you goddamn bastard! Don't you know that? Don't you know that I'll have you thrown in jail for it?"

"If you want to send the sheriff for me in the morning, I'll be at home. I won't try to escape. There's no place to go."

Dave Mitchum was six-foot-two and had the build of a bruiser, but he stood shaking with fury and terror over the delicate figure of Bill Brent. "You can't quit! There's a law against it! I've got a law! You can't walk out on me! I won't let you out! I won't let you leave this building tonight!"

Brent walked to the door. "Will you repeat that order you gave me, in front of the others? No? Then I will!"

As he pulled the door open, Mitchum's fist shot out, smashed into his face and knocked him down.

The trainmaster and the road foreman stood in the open doorway.

"He quit!" screamed Mitchum. "The yellow bastard quit at a time like this! He's a law-breaker and a coward!"

In the slow effort of rising from the floor, through the haze of blood running into his eyes, Bill Brent looked up at the two men. He saw that they understood, but he saw the closed faces of men who did not want to understand, did not want to interfere and hated him for putting them on the spot in the name of justice. He said nothing, rose to his feet and walked out of the building.

Mitchum avoided looking at the others. "Hey, you," he called, jerking his head at the night dispatcher across the room. "Come here.

You've got to take over at once."

With the door closed, he repeated to the boy the story of the Diesel at Fairmount, as he had given it to Brent, and the order to send the Comet through with Engine Number 306, if the boy did not hear from him in half an hour. The boy was in no condition to think, to speak or to understand anything: he kept seeing the blood on the face of Bill Brent, who had been

his idol. "Yes, sir," he answered numbly Dave Mitchum departed for Fairmount, announcing to every yardman, switchman and wiper in sight, as he boarded the track motor car that he was going in search of a Diesel for the Comet.

The night dispatcher sat at his desk, watching the clock and the telephone, praying that the telephone would ring and let him hear from Mr. Mitchum. But the half-hour went by in silence, and whet there were only three minutes left, the boy felt a terror he could not explain, except that he did not want to send that order, He turned to the trainmaster and the road foreman, asking hesitantly, "Mr. Mitchum gave me an order before he left, but I wonder whether I ought to send it, because I . . . I don't think it's right. He said—"

The trainmaster turned away; he felt no pity: the boy was about the same age as his brother had been.

The road foreman snapped, "Do just as Mr. Mitchum told you.

You're not supposed to think," and walked out of the room.

The responsibility that James Taggart and Clifton Locey had evaded now rested on the shoulders of a trembling, bewildered boy. He hesitated, then he buttressed his courage with the thought that one did not doubt the good faith and the competence of railroad executives. He did not know that his vision of a railroad and its executives was that of a century ago.

With the conscientious precision of a railroad man, in the moment when the hand of the clock ended the half-hour, he signed his name to the order instructing the Comet to proceed with Engine Number 306, and transmitted the order to Winston Station.

The station agent at Winston shuddered when he looked at the order, but he was not the man to defy authority. He told himself that the tunnel was not, perhaps, as dangerous as he thought. He told himself that the best policy, these days, was not to think.

When he handed their copies of the order to the conductor and the engineer of the Comet, the conductor glanced slowly about the room, from face to face, folded the slip of paper, put it into his pocket and walked out without a word.

The engineer stood looking at the paper for a moment, then threw it down and said, "I'm not going to do it. And if it's come to where this railroad hands out orders like this one, I'm not going to work for it, either. Just list me as having quit."

"But you can't quit!" cried the station agent, "They'll arrest you for it!"

"If they find me," said the engineer, and walked out of the station into the vast darkness of the mountain night.

The engineer from Silver Springs, who had brought in Number 306, was sitting in a corner of the room. He chuckled and said, "He's yellow."

The station agent turned to him. "Will you do it, Joe? Will you take the Comet?"

Joe Scott was drunk. There had been a time when a railroad man, reporting for duty with any sign of intoxication, would have been regarded as a doctor arriving for work with sores of smallpox on his face.

But Joe Scott was a privileged person. Three months ago, he had been fired for an infraction of safety rules, which had caused a major wreck; two weeks ago, he had been reinstated in his job by order of the Unification Board. He was a friend of Fred Kinnan; he protected Kinnan's interests in his union, not against the employers, but against the membership.

"Sure," said Joe Scott. "I'll take the Comet. I'll get her through, if I go fast enough."

The fireman of Number 306 had remained in the cab of his engine.

He looked up uneasily, when they came to switch his engine to the head end of the Comet; he looked up at the red and green lights of the tunnel, hanging

in the distance above twenty miles of curves. But he was a placid, amicable fellow, who made a good fireman with no hope of ever rising to engineer; his husky muscles were his only asset.

He felt certain that his superiors knew what they were doing, so he did not venture any questions.

The conductor stood by the rear end of the Comet. He looked at the lights of the tunnel, then at the long chain of the Comet's windows. A few windows were lighted, but most of them showed only the feeble blue glow of night lamps edging the lowered blinds. He thought that he should rouse the passengers and warn them. There had been a time when he had placed the safety of the passengers above his own, not by reason of love for his fellow men, but because that responsibility was part of his job, which he accepted and felt pride in fulfilling. Now, he felt a contemptuous indifference and no desire to save them. They had asked for and accepted Directive 10-289, he thought, they went on living and daily turning away in evasion from the kind of verdicts that the Unification Board was passing on defenseless victims—why shouldn't he now turn away from them? If he saved their lives, not one of them would come forward to defend him when the Unification Board would convict him for disobeying orders, for creating a panic, for delaying Mr. Chalmers. He had no desire to be a martyr for the sake of allowing people safely to indulge in their own irresponsible evil.

When the moment came, he raised his lantern and signaled the engineer to start.

"See?" said Kip Chalmers triumphantly to Lester Tuck, as the wheels under their feet shuddered forward. "Fear is the only practical means to deal with people."

The conductor stepped onto the vestibule of the last car. No one saw him as he went down the steps of the other side, slipped off the train and vanished into the darkness of the mountains.

A switchman stood ready to throw the switch that would send the Comet from the siding onto the main track. He looked at the Comet as it came slowly toward him. It was only a blazing white globe with a beam stretching high above his head, and a jerky thunder trembling through the rail under his feet. He knew that the switch should not be thrown. He thought of the night, ten years ago, when he had risked his life in a flood to save a train from a washout. But he knew that times had changed. In the moment when he threw the switch and saw the headlight jerk sidewise, he knew that he would now hate his job for the rest of his life.

The Comet uncoiled from the siding into a thin, straight line, and went on into the mountains, with the beam of the headlight like an extended arm pointing the way, and the lighted glass curve of the observation lounge ending it off.

Some of the passengers aboard the Comet were awake. As the train started its coiling ascent, they saw the small cluster of Winston's lights at the bottom of the darkness beyond their windows, then the same darkness, but with red and green lights by the hole of a tunnel on the upper edge of the windowpanes. The lights of Winston kept growing smaller, each time they appeared; the black hole of the tunnel kept growing larger. A black veil went streaking past the windows at times, dimming the lights: it was the heavy smoke from the coal-burning engine.

As the tunnel came closer, they saw, on the edge of the sky far to the south, in a void of space and rock, a spot of living fire twisting in the wind. They did not know what it was and did not care to learn.

It is said that catastrophes are a matter of pure chance, and there were those who would have said that the passengers of the Comet were not guilty or responsible for the thing that happened to them.

The man in Bedroom A, Car No. 1, was a professor of sociology who taught that individual ability is of no consequence, that individual effort is futile, that an individual conscience is a useless luxury, that there is no individual mind or character or achievement, that everything is achieved collectively, and that it's masses that count, not men.

The man in Roomette 7, Car No. 2, was a journalist who wrote that it is proper and moral to use compulsion "for a good cause," who believed that he had the right to unleash physical force upon others—

to wreck lives, throttle ambitions, strangle desires, violate convictions, to imprison, to despoil, to murder—for the sake of whatever he chose to consider as his own idea of "a good cause," which did not even have to be an idea, since he had never defined what he regarded as the good, but had merely stated that he went by "a feeling"—a feeling unrestrained by any knowledge, since he considered emotion superior to knowledge and relied solely on his own "good intentions" and on the power of a gun.

The woman in Roomette 10, Car No. 3, was an elderly schoolteacher who had spent her life turning class after class of helpless children into miserable cowards, by teaching them that the will of the majority is the only standard of good and evil, that a majority may do anything it pleases, that they must not assert their own personalities, but must do as others were doing.

The man in Drawing Room B, Car No, 4, was a newspaper publisher who believed that men are evil by nature and unfit for freedom, that their basic instincts, if left unchecked, are to lie, to rob and to murder one another—and, therefore, men must be ruled by means of lies, robbery and murder, which must be made the exclusive privilege of the rulers, for the purpose of forcing men to work, teaching them to be moral and keeping them within the bounds of order and justice.

The man in Bedroom H, Car No. 5, was a businessman who had acquired his business, an ore mine, with the help of a government loan, under the Equalization of Opportunity Bill.

The man in Drawing Room A, Car No. 6, was a financier who had made a fortune by buying "frozen" railroad bonds and getting his friends in Washington to "defreeze" them.

The man in Seat 5, Car No, 7, was a worker who believed that he had "a right" to a job, whether his employer wanted him or not.

The woman in Roomette 6, Car No. 8, was a lecturer who believed that, as a consumer, she had "a right" to transportation, whether the railroad people wished to provide it or not.

The man in Roomette 2, Car No. 9, was a professor of economics who advocated the abolition of private property, explaining that intelligence plays no part in industrial production, that man's mind is conditioned by material tools, that anybody can run a factory or a railroad and it's only a matter of seizing the machinery.

The woman in Bedroom D, Car No. 10, was a mother who had put her two children to sleep in the berth above her, carefully tucking them in, protecting them from drafts and jolts; a mother whose husband held a government job enforcing directives, which she defended by saying, "I don't care, it's only the rich that they hurt. After all, I must think of my children."

[Ronnie Hayek]

Merci de ta diligence.

Donc, cela confirme bien l'interprétation de Melo.

[Patrick Smets]

Jabial, tu serais un ange si tu pouvais traduire ton extrait en Français.

[Apollon]

Et le résumer en 50 mots.

[Invité jabial]

Merci de ta diligence.

Donc, cela confirme bien l'interprétation de Melo.

Il y a des des limites à la présomption de bonne foi et tu les as dépassées.

Soit tu es vraiment bouché, soit tu mens sciemment pour induire en erreur les membres de ce forum.

Dans le second cas, je te rappelle que ta religion prône la Vérité, pas le gramscisme. On ne "protège" ni n'"éduque" pas les gens en leur racontant des conneries, et devant l'évidence des faits ça devient ridicule.

Que Mélodius ait lu le passage un peu vite, je veux bien, mais deux ça fait trop.

En réponse à Schnappi : la traduction comme le résumé non seulement me prendraient du temps, mais encore ne prouveraient rien puisqu'on pourrait encore m'accuser de déformer les choses. Ce n'est pas si long que ça a lire, et vu les accusations portées, ça vaut la peine. Prenez 5 minutes pour le faire.

[Patrick Smets]

En réponse à Schnappi : la traduction comme le résumé non seulement me prendraient du temps,

T'en fais pas, c'était une blague.

[Ronnie Hayek]

Il y a des des limites à la présomption de bonne foi et tu les as dépassées.

Soit tu es vraiment bouché, soit tu mens sciemment pour induire en erreur les membres de ce forum.

Dans le second cas, je te rappelle que ta religion prône la Vérité, pas le gramscisme. On ne "protège" ni n'"éduque" pas les gens en leur racontant des conneries, et devant l'évidence des faits ça devient ridicule.

En réponse à Schnappi : la traduction comme le résumé non seulement me prendraient du temps, mais encore ne prouveraient rien puisqu'on pourrait encore m'accuser de déformer les choses. Ce n'est pas si long que ça a lire, et vu les accusations portées, ça vaut la peine. Prenez 5 minutes pour le faire.

A ton avis, pourquoi le narrateur détaille-t-il par le menu les personnalités des passagers cités, sinon pour laisser entendre qu'à son estime, ces gens sont responsables de la catastrophe dont ils ont été victimes ?

EDIT : et quand quelqu'un ment, c'est toujours sciemment, par définition.

[Invité jabial]

A ton avis, pourquoi le narrateur détaille-t-il par le menu les personnalités des passagers cités, sinon pour laisser entendre qu'à son estime, ces gens sont responsables de la catastrophe dont ils ont été victimes ?

Tu résumes la thèse de Mélodius à ça?

Je te signale qu'il accuse les "surhommes" d'avoir organisé l'accident pour tuer les passagers, dans le but de les punir de leur collectivisme.

Quant à ces gens, oui, ils ont contribué à bâtir le monde qui a rendu cette catastrophe possible.

[Ronnie Hayek]

Tu résumes la thèse de Mélodius à ça?

Je te signale qu'il accuse les "surhommes" d'avoir tué les passagers.

Tu as loupé un épisode : il avait entre-temps rectifié son point de vue pour aboutir à celui que je viens donc d'exposer.

Quant à ces gens, oui, ils ont contribué à bâtir le monde qui a rendu cette catastrophe possible.

Cette extension de la chaîne de responsabilités est absurde. Surtout, il est monstrueux de dire que ces gens sont fautifs de ce qui leur est arrivé sur l'air de "c'est bien fait pour leur gueule".

Il est d'ailleurs intéressant de relever que tu refuses la responsabilité quand elle s'applique véritablement (voir ton rejet de la responsabilité extracontractuelle), mais que tu en étends par ailleurs le sens de manière si irréaliste.

[Invité jabial]

Tu as loupé un épisode : il avait entre-temps rectifié son point de vue pour aboutir à celui que je viens donc d'exposer.

Où ça? Si vraiment il est revenu en arrière sur cette accusation, qui n'est ni plus ni moins que l'objectivisme encourage le meurtre, ça mérite une clarification.

Cette extension de la chaîne de responsabilités est absurde. Surtout, il est monstrueux de dire que ces gens sont fautifs de ce qui leur est arrivé.

Il est d'ailleurs intéressant de relever que tu refuses la responsabilité quand elle s'applique véritablement (voir ton rejet de la responsabilité extracontractuelle), mais que tu en étendes par ailleurs le sens de manière si irréaliste.

Tu ne vois pas la différence entre la responsabilité légale, qui conduit à pouvoir employer la force contre quelqu'un, et la responsabilité morale, qui n'autorise à rien d'autre qu'à constater? Ces gens ont construit le monde qui a rendu leur accident possible. Que dire d'un trotskyste qui finit au goulag? C'est triste (et d'ailleurs, plus loin dans le bouquin, Dagny Taggart, l'héroïne, est si choquée par cet accident qu'elle renonce temporairement à se retirer), mais où était-il pendant qu'on y envoyait les koulak?

[Patrick Smets]

Je partage totalement l'opinion de Jabial.

L'argument du livre, c'est la vieille maxime "le poisson pourrit par la tête". Et quand on prêche des opinions politiques qui reviennent à nier la responsabilité individuelle et le devoir de contrevenir aux ordres absurdes, on participe à la création d'une culture qui conduit à des monstruosités comme celle décrite dans cet épisode. Donc, oui, les personnes du trains portent une part de responsabilité dans l'accident.

Dire ça, ce n'est pas se réjouir de leur mort, ni appeler au massacre. C'est l'observation d'un fait.

[Ronnie Hayek]

Où ça? Si vraiment il est revenu en arrière sur cette accusation, qui n'est ni plus ni moins que l'objectivisme encourage le meurtre, ça mérite une clarification.

http://www.liberaux.org/index.php?s=&showt…ndpost&p=202787

Tu ne vois pas la différence entre la responsabilité légale, qui conduit à pouvoir employer la force contre quelqu'un, et la responsabilité morale, qui n'autorise à rien d'autre qu'à constater? Ces gens ont construit le monde qui a rendu leur accident possible.

Un simple constat ? Cette scène est au contraire construite pour attiser la haine du lecteur sur les "collectivistes". C'est une "démonstration" digne du théâtre didactique à la sauce soviétique. Bref, c'est du sartrisme à la sauce objectiviste.

Ensuite, il est ici question d'une catastrophe précise, pas de la situation politique du pays en général.

En quoi les personnes suivantes méritent-elles leur sort atroce ?

- "The woman in Roomette 10, Car No. 3, was an elderly schoolteacher who had spent her life turning class after class of helpless children into miserable cowards, by teaching them that the will of the majority is the only standard of good and evil, that a majority may do anything it pleases, that they must not assert their own personalities, but must do as others were doing." (RH : ignoble comportement, justement châtié, cela va sans dire… )

- "The man in Seat 5, Car No, 7, was a worker who believed that he had "a right" to a job, whether his employer wanted him or not."

- "The woman in Roomette 6, Car No. 8, was a lecturer who believed that, as a consumer, she had "a right" to transportation, whether the railroad people wished to provide it or not." (Abominable criminel, comme le précédent passager, auquel cet accident aura évidemment appris à véritablement vivre en homme libre)

Et la cerise sur le gâteau :

- "The woman in Bedroom D, Car No. 10, was a mother who had put her two children to sleep in the berth above her, carefully tucking them in, protecting them from drafts and jolts; a mother whose husband held a government job enforcing directives, which she defended by saying, "I don't care, it's only the rich that they hurt. After all, I must think of my children."

Donc, à la manière léniniste, la sanction randienne tombe également sur les gosses des méchants collectivistes… C'est du joli !

Que dire d'un trotskyste qui finit au goulag? C'est triste (et d'ailleurs, plus loin dans le bouquin, Dagny Taggart, l'héroïne, est si choquée par cet accident qu'elle renonce temporairement à se retirer), mais où était-il pendant qu'on y envoyait les koulak?

Ce n'est pas de cela qu'il est question.

Je partage totalement l'opinion de Jabial.

L'argument du livre, c'est la vieille maxime "le poisson pourrit par la tête".

Formule de Mao, si je ne m'abuse.

Dire ça, ce n'est pas se réjouir de leur mort, ni appeler au massacre. C'est l'observation d'un fait.

Diras-tu que Condorcet a eu ce qu'il méritait en crevant dans sa geôle révolutionnaire à Bourg-la-Reine (rebaptisé alors Bourg-l'Egalité), eu égard à sa pensée libérale-constructiviste ?

[Patrick Smets]

http://www.liberaux.org/index.php?s=&showt…ndpost&p=202787

Un simple constat ? Cette scène est au contraire construite pour attiser la haine du lecteur sur les "collectivistes".

Tu sais que tu mériterais le Pulizer pour un scoop de cette envergure. Rand essaye d'attiser le haine des lecteurs sur les colectivistes. Ben, oui. CPS aussi d'ailleurs, et je l'en remercie.

C'est une "démonstration" digne du théâtre didactique à la sauce soviétique. Bref, c'est du sartrisme à la sauce objectiviste.

Que ce soit mal écrit me semble quand même un autre problème….

Ensuite, il est ici question d'une catastrophe précise, pas de la situation politique du pays en général.

C'est une figure littéraire. Et cette catastrophe n'est due qu'à la situation politique du pays. C'est tout le thème de ce passage, que la catastrophe n'est pas une fatalité du destin, mais la conséquence de la régulation du travail mise en place par le gouvernement.

En quoi les personnes suivantes méritent-elles leur sort atroce ?

Chacune d'elle symbolise l'un des maillons de la chaîne de commandement qui a abouti à la catastrophe. Ce que Ayn Rand met en évidence, c'est que dans les plus petits détails de nos vies, nous pouvons participer à l'escalvage ou le contrer. D'où l'intérêt de lister ces "innocents".

- "The woman in Roomette 10, Car No. 3, was an elderly schoolteacher who had spent her life turning class after class of helpless children into miserable cowards, by teaching them that the will of the majority is the only standard of good and evil, that a majority may do anything it pleases, that they must not assert their own personalities, but must do as others were doing." (RH : ignoble comportement, justement châtié, cela va sans dire… )

Sans doute une maitresse pareille qui fait que le dernier gamin n'ose pas refuser les ordres de son chef.

- "The man in Seat 5, Car No, 7, was a worker who believed that he had "a right" to a job, whether his employer wanted him or not."

C'est ce genre de revendication qui a fait mettre en place la "commission d'attribution des emplois" qui crée tellement de peur chez tous les participants du passage.

- "The woman in Roomette 6, Car No. 8, was a lecturer who believed that, as a consumer, she had "a right" to transportation, whether the railroad people wished to provide it or not."

Représentant à son niveau de la mentalité du politicien par la faute de qui tout arrive.

Et la cerise sur le gâteau :

- "The woman in Bedroom D, Car No. 10, was a mother who had put her two children to sleep in the berth above her, carefully tucking them in, protecting them from drafts and jolts; a mother whose husband held a government job enforcing directives, which she defended by saying, "I don't care, it's only the rich that they hurt. After all, I must think of my children."

Il est évident que c'est l'autre partie de la phrase qui est importante, " don't care, it's only the rich that they hurt." Et une façon pour Ayn Rand de dire que protéger la propriété privée, c'est aussi protéger efficacement ses enfants.

Diras-tu que Condorcet a eu ce qu'il méritait en crevant dans sa geôle révolutionnaire à Bourg-la-Reine (rebaptisé alors Bourg-l'Egalité), eu égard à sa pensée libérale-constructiviste ?

C'est toi qui vient avec des idées de punitions/récompenses. Il s'agit ici d'un enchaînement de faits qui ont des conséquences.

Et oui, les libéraux français qui ont fait appel au peuple et ont déclenché le cycle de la violence révolutionnaire porte une responsabilité dans les massacres dont ils ont été victime par la suite.

De même qu'Albert Jacquart ou Ricardo Petrella sont dans une certaine mesure responsables du chômage massif en Belgique.

[Ronnie Hayek]

Ta mauvaise foi est sidérante - et bravo pour le coup de la figure littéraire, merci je n'avais pas compris ! C'est précisément à la finesse de ce genre de trope que l'on s'aperçoit des grandes qualités d'écrivain de miss Rand.

La remarque sur l'instit' est une pure pétition de principe. C'est là aussi que l'on se rend compte de la prégnance d'un individualisme naïf, du type John Stuart Mill (le mépris pour le conformisme social, ce dernier étant assimilé à un rejet de la liberté).

Je note que, concernant la dernière passagère, tu escamotes le fait que ses mômes y passent aussi vu qu'ils sont présents avec elle dans le train.

C'est toi qui vient avec des idées de punitions/récompenses. Il s'agit ici d'un enchaînement de faits qui ont des conséquences.

Et oui, les libéraux français qui ont fait appel au peuple et ont déclenché le cycle de la violence révolutionnaire porte une responsabilité dans les massacres dont ils ont été victime par la suite.

Ce n'est pas moi qui viens avec ces idées, mais Rand ! C'est une question de figure littéraire comme tu dirais; elle recouvre d'une fausse neutralité sa joie de voir crever des "pillards" (dont certains le sont moins que d'autres, je le rappelle).

C'est avec ce genre de raisonnement que certains de ses héritiers souhaitent voir raser La Mecque en déclarant que les civils n'ont pas à être épargnés puisqu'ils ont choisi de rester dans les parages. Comme il a déjà été signalé : on reconnaît l'arbre à ses fruits.

Sinon, heureux que tu admettes enfin le caractère plus qu'ambigu des Lumières françaises.

EDIT : et quid de ta référence involontaire à Mao pour caractériser la thèse randienne ?

[Coldstar]

Je me suis tapé l'extrait posté par Jabial en entier.

J'ai plutôt aimé, l'intrigue se déroule bien, même si le style n'est pas exceptionnel, on voit surgir de manière un peu trop voyante certaines "obsessions", mais la dénonciation du pourrissement du système, la radiographie de la bureaucratie à la dérive, elle, est implacable.

Ce qui est à souligner, c'est que la charge porte beaucoup moins contre le déni de liberté que contre l'effondrement de la responsabilité individuelle dans la sphère sociale. J'ai envie d'accoler à la pensée d'Ayn Rand, à la lecture de cet extrait, une maxime du type "faites qu'ils soient libres, pour qu'ils soient responsables".

Même si le descriptif par le menu de la qualité des victimes sent, au choix, le règlement de comptes, le défoulement sadique jubilatoire,ou l'invocation d'un poing vengeur quasi-biblique, je ne comprend absolument pas en quoi ces victimes seraient "responsables" de ce qui leur arrive. Rand utilise, de manière pas très fine encore une fois, ce lieu commun de la littérature qu'est le recours à l'ironie du sort.

[Patrick Smets]

Ta mauvaise foi est sidérante

la meilleure défense, c'est l'attaque. Je ne t'imaginais pas te livrant à des petits jeux politiciens de ce genre.

La remarque sur l'instit' est une pure pétition de principe. C'est là aussi que l'on se rend compte de la prégnance d'un individualisme naïf, du type John Stuart Mill (le mépris pour le conformisme social assimilé à un rejet de la liberté).

nawak. Depuis quand "le conformisme social" et "the will of majority is the only standard of good and evil". En plus, je te signale gentiment que c'est exactement ce genre de propos qui te plaisent dans le bouche du pape.

Je note que, concernant la dernière passagère, tu passes à côté du fait que ses mômes y passent aussi vu qu'ils sont présents avec elle dans le train.

Ayn Rand aurait écrit que les gosses étaient resté à la maison, tu y verrais une tentative de justifier les abandons d'enfant….

elle recouvre d'une fausse neutralité sa joie de voir crever des "pillards" (dont certains le sont moins que d'autres, je le rappelle).

Je ne sais pas comment tu peux voir ça dans ce texte. Tu lui imputes tes propres phantasmes.

C'est avec ce genre de raisonnement que certains de ses héritiers souhaitent voir raser La Mecque en disant que les civils n'ont pas à être épargnés.

Et Christ est responsable des crimes de Judas

Comme il a déjà été signalé : on reconnaît l'arbre à ses fruits.

Comme c'est aisé.

Sinon, heureux que tu admettes enfin le caractère plus qu'ambigu des Lumières françaises.

Ca me fait plaisir que tu en sois heureux, même si je n'ai rien dit à ce sujet, mais peu importe.

EDIT : et quid de ta référence involontaire à Mao pour caractériser la thèse randienne ?

J'ignorais que c'était de Mao et je trouve ça d'une grande vérité. Un peuple qui n'a plus d'absolu et de morale va se détruire progressivement. C'est d'ailleurs, je pense le message de tous les papes, mais sans doute est-on Maoïste au Vatican.

[Fredo]

::Entonne un air::

…les collectivistes sont nos amis, il faut les aimer aussi…

la la la

[Coldstar]

Je note que, concernant la dernière passagère, tu escamotes le fait que ses mômes y passent aussi vu qu'ils sont présents avec elle dans le train.

Heureusement, ce n'est qu'un roman

[Ronnie Hayek]

l

nawak. Depuis quand "le conformisme social" et "the will of majority is the only standard of good and evil". En plus, je te signale gentiment que c'est exactement ce genre de propos qui te plaisent dans le bouche du pape.

Je parlais de ceci, que j'avais souligné (contrairement à la référence aux supposés droits de la majorité) : "that they must not assert their own personalities, but must do as others were doing." Et merci de laisser Benny hors de cette discussion.

J'ignorais que c'était de Mao et je trouve ça d'une grande vérité. Un peuple qui n'a plus d'absolu et de morale va se détruire progressivement. C'est d'ailleurs, je pense le message de tous les papes, mais sans doute est-on Maoïste au Vatican.

D'abord, merci encore une fois de laisser le Vatican hors de tout cela. Ceci dit, le fait que tu recours à cette ruse rhétorique laisse entendre que nous avons frappé où cela faisait mal en démontrant l'ignominie morale de l'égoïsme randien.

Ensuite, je doute fort qu'au Saint-Siège on s'enthousiasme pour la morale randienne qui conduit à applaudir au déraillement de trains bondés de collectivistes réels ou supposés.

Heureusement, ce n'est qu'un roman

Ah, ah. Welke ironisme.

[Patrick Smets]

le fait que tu recours à cette ruse rhétorique

laisse entendre que nous

Tiens, tu t'es mis au majestatif ?

avons frappé où cela faisait mal

Je me tords de douleur sur le sol.

en démontrant l'ignominie morale de l'égoïsme randien..

Pour moi, cette "discussion" est close.

[pierreyves]

Je suis navré, mais tu confonds subjectivité de la valeur (qui concerne uniquement les échanges économiques) et la question des valeurs au sens éthique du terme. Ce qui explique que tu ne comprennes pas mes réponses, à mon avis.

Pas du tout.

Bien entendu tu n'es pas obligé de répondre à la question, mais dire que je confonds jugement de valeur éthique et valeur économique pour t'en sortir ce n'est pas très sport

Donc j'attends en fait toujours une réponse à la question à laquelle tu as évité de répondre depuis le début de notre échange : d'où tires tu tes jugements de valeur ?

J'ai comme l'impression que c'est honteux ??

Si quelqu'un d'autre à une idée ??

[Fredo]

Heureusement, ce n'est qu'un roman

Oui, faut pas l'oublier, non plus.

[pankkake]

Cette extension de la chaîne de responsabilités est absurde. Surtout, il est monstrueux de dire que ces gens sont fautifs de ce qui leur est arrivé sur l'air de "c'est bien fait pour leur gueule".

Est-ce que quand on publie les statistiques d'accidents de voiture, avec le pourcentage d'entre eux dûs à l'alcoolisme, on dit que c'est bien fait pour la gueule de ceux qui ont bu ?

[Ronnie Hayek]

Pas du tout.

Bien entendu tu n'es pas obligé de répondre à la question, mais dire que je confonds jugement de valeur éthique et valeur économique pour t'en sortir ce n'est pas très sport

Donc j'attends en fait toujours une réponse à la question à laquelle tu as évité de répondre depuis le début de notre échange : d'où tires tu tes jugements de valeur ?

J'ai comme l'impression que c'est honteux ??

Si quelqu'un d'autre à une idée ??

C'est surtout que je ne comprends pas cette question, qui me rappelle un peu trop le "de quel lieu parles-tu ?" qui sévissait naguère.

Ensuite, je suis las (mais je mentirais en ajoutant : surpris) qu'il faille presque se justifier de trouver que l'argumentaire randien renverse l'éthique cul par dessus tête.

Est-ce que quand on publie les statistiques d'accidents de voiture, avec le pourcentage d'entre eux dûs à l'alcoolisme, on dit que c'est bien fait pour la gueule de ceux qui ont bu ?

Ne fais pas semblant de ne pas comprendre (bien qu'il semble que le problème du mal t'échappe complètement) : il n'est pas question d'observations statistiques ici, mais d'une "oeuvre d'art" (sic) organisée en vue de défendre un propos politique.

Oui, faut pas l'oublier, non plus.

Roman considéré comme un bréviaire inaltérable et omniscient par ses adeptes. Il suffit de voir la défense acharnée dont il fait l'objet ici pour se faire une idée de sa réception dans les milieux clairement acquis à la pensée du gourou.

[pankkake]

Ne fais pas semblant de ne pas comprendre (bien qu'il semble que le problème du mal t'échappe complètement) : il n'est pas question d'observations statistiques ici, mais d'une "oeuvre d'art" (sic) organisée en vue de défendre un propos politique.

Ce que je comprends à la lecture :

* L'alcoolisme provoque des accidents (de voiture). Sauvez des vies, ne buvez pas.

* Le collectivisme provoque des accidents (de train). Sauvez des vies, soyez libéral.

[Invité jabial]

…les collectivistes sont nos amis, il faut les aimer aussi…

J'aime les collectivistes. Je veux dire, regardez. Quand la religion interdit de manger d'un animal, elle le qualifie d'abominable. Ce qui est beau et bon, par contre, doit être mangé. Le collectiviste peut s'assaisonner de diverses façons : ainsi, même si le plus beau plat de coco est celui où l'abbattoir est de sa propre construction (exemple : Russie soviétique, détruite sous le poids de son propre régime), il arrive parfois que des collectivistes en écrasent d'autres (exemple : régime nazi, écrabouillé par le rouleau compresseur soviétique, ou communisme chilien, saigné à blanc par Pine-hochet dit I-want-them-alive-not), et même que d'honnêtes gens arrivent à s'en débarrasser (révolution US - l'anglois est reparti les pieds devant).

Je propose de créer une tombe du collectiviste inconnu, tombé sous le poids de sa propre connerie.

En fait, une seule chose me dérange dans cet épisode : je ne sais pas par quel miracle il n'y a pas d'innocent dans le train. Mais bon, c'est du droit de l'auteur de jouer un peu avec le réalisme. Elle dit qu'il n'y a pas d'innocent, je la crois donc.

[pierreyves]

C'est surtout que je ne comprends pas cette question, qui me rappelle un peu trop le "de quel lieu parles-tu ?" qui sévissait naguère.

Je n'ai pas compris ton allusion et moi c'est par manque de culture .

Par contre, je ne vois pas comment tu peux soutenir ne pas comprendre ma question simple : d'où tires tu tes jugements de valeurs (éthique, pour éviter tout malentendu) ?

Encore une fois tu me donnes l'impression de ne pas vouloir répondre ?!

Peut-être ma question est-elle trop théorique ? Prenons en exemple l'extrait de Sade que tu cites plus haut (comme ça on est d'accord pour critiquer tous les deux) :

Que désire-t-on quand on jouit ? Que tout ce qui nous entoure ne s'occupe que de nous, ne pense qu'à nous, ne soigne que nous. Si les objets qui nous servent jouissent, les voilà dès lors bien plus sûrement occupés d'eux que de nous, et notre jouissance conséquemment dérangée. Il n'est point d'homme qui ne veuille être despote quand il bande ; il semble qu'il a moins de plaisir si les autres paraissent en prendre autant que lui. Par un mouvement d'orgueil bien naturel en ce moment, il voudrait être le seul au monde qui fût susceptible d'éprouver ce qu'il sent […] Il est faux d'ailleurs qu'il y ait du plaisir à en donner aux autres. En faisant du mal, au contraire, il éprouve tous les charmes que goûte un individu nerveux à faire usage de ses forces ; il domine alors, il est tyran. Et quelle différence pour l'amour-propre !

Par quel mécanisme de jugement de valeur rejettes tu cette attitude comme "mal". Cela me permettrait de savoir comment tu formes tes jugements de valeur…

Ensuite, je suis las (mais je mentirais en ajoutant : surpris) qu'il faille presque se justifier de trouver que l'argumentaire randien renverse l'éthique cul par dessus tête.

Ce n'est pas la question donc tu n'as pas à être las .

[Invité jabial]

A tout hasard, pourquoi je rejette le passage de Sade que tu as cité :

Que désire-t-on quand on jouit ? Que tout ce qui nous entoure ne s'occupe que de nous, ne pense qu'à nous, ne soigne que nous.

Non sequitur. Quand je jouis, moi, je désire que cette jouissance se répande aussi loin que possible. Le plaisir pris seul a toujours un goût d'inachevé.

Si les objets qui nous servent

Une personne n'est pas un animal sacrificiel

jouissent, les voilà dès lors bien plus sûrement occupés d'eux que de nous, et notre jouissance conséquemment dérangée.

Il était bien malade…

Il n'est point d'homme qui ne veuille être despote quand il bande

Et comme tous les fous, il prend ses délires pour des généralités.

il semble qu'il a moins de plaisir si les autres paraissent en prendre autant que lui.

Ca, c'est typique de ce qu'Ayn Rand appelle l'homme de seconde main : il ne mesure pas son plaisir ou sa souffrance par rapport à ce que lui désire, mais par rapport au plaisir et à la souffrance des autres. C'est une attitude qui, comme Sade en est un exemple, conduit à la perversion - faire le mal pour ressentir le bien par contraste.

Par un mouvement d'orgueil bien naturel en ce moment, il voudrait être le seul au monde qui fût susceptible d'éprouver ce qu'il sent […]

C'est tout le contraire.

Il est faux d'ailleurs qu'il y ait du plaisir à en donner aux autres.

Bien sûr que si. N'importe qui est capable du tuer ; faire du bien, là est la vraie puissance.

En faisant du mal, au contraire, il éprouve tous les charmes que goûte un individu nerveux à faire usage de ses forces ; il domine alors, il est tyran. Et quelle différence pour l'amour-propre !

Un tyran est un homme de seconde main, quelqu'un qui a si peu de respect pour lui-même qu'il mesure sa valeur non plus même à ce que les autres pensent de lui, mais à l'apparence qu'il peut les forcer à donner de cette opinion.

Pour résumer en langage non-randien : si tu as besoin de violer, c'est que tu as une petite bite.