Why is the word "must" so disliked in the "modern world"? Everyone wants only rights and freedoms, but they forget about their obligations to the state and people?

One Answer

1. One of my old friends, who served in the Navy for three years on a ship, let's say, special purpose, went around the world on it, saw a lot of things and experienced, to my question: “Why do the sailors hold on so tightly, so stand up for each other?” I answered without hesitation: “So it's very simple: if today you didn't jump into the water after a friend who fell overboard, tomorrow you will fall – and no one will jump after you.” So much for your sense of duty.

   If a normal person who is in trouble is bailed out by someone, this person, if he is a person, and not an ungrateful creature, an unworthy person, will feel a natural sense of debt towards the person who got out of it, which, according to the proverb, is a red payment, and look for an opportunity to pay this debt. This is what concerns debts to people. (The post-war generation remembers that no fathers had stronger friends than the front-line ones.)

   And with the debt to the state, the situation is exactly the same. Let's say, for example, that I (not me personally, but some abstract me) was born in a state medical institution, where my mother and I were provided with all the necessary assistance, and free of charge. I went to a free public school, where I received a good secondary education. While I was in school, the state, through medical commissions from the military enlistment office, closely monitored my health (it needed healthy guys, future soldiers, not disabled people, and the health of girls, as future mothers, was also closely monitored). After graduating from the university, I got (free of charge) a reliable profession, which in the state institution where I work, feeds me to this day. And when I became seriously ill, the state doctors cured me, maybe even they saved my life. And someone who was attacked by a criminal saved the life of a policeman in the civil service. After all this, do I owe the state something or not? And by the way, the Red Army men in 41st-45th defended quite consciously (yes, you can read their letters again, if you still have them) precisely the state that they considered their own.

   And if the state is dissatisfied with the way its citizens perform their duty to it, it should probably look at how it performs its duty to them. Like a sailor's.

   That's all. A person is not born with a sense of duty, this feeling is brought up in him, and not by teachers (in words), but by life circumstances (in deeds). The sense of duty is based on solidarity and the need of people (and the state is also people) for mutual assistance and mutual assistance. With the devaluation of these qualities, the very concept and idea of debt devalues, and often atrophies.

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