C’est par l’intérêt, l’intelligence ou même le jeu médiatique que le bien se réalisera le plus sûrement, là où l’ancienne idéologie du devoir s’est avérée plus d’une fois meurtrière. Mourir pour la patrie, mourir pour des idées ? Et pourquoi pas, après tout, vivre pour elles, de manière paisible, raisonnable et, au total, plus efficace qu’aux temps de l’abnégation religieuse ou laïque. La conclusion s’impose: le prétendu « retour de l’éthique » n’en serait pas un si l’on entend par là une résurgence des morales du devoir. Malgré quelques velléités, les valeurs caritatives du dévouement à l’autre n’occuperaient qu’une part infime du terrain face à l’empire des égoïsmes, de la consommation et du bien-être.
Luc Ferry (1977:90) L’homme-Dieu. ISBN-13: 9782253142614
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www.amazon.com/Making-Monsters-Uncanny-Power-Dehumanization/dp/0674545567
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The head of a nationalist state still holds the possibility of representing in the eyes of his people the incomparable genius of his nation, a sacred entity because it is su-perior to its members.
The revolutionary leader pre-served, for better or worse, the sense of incarnating a sacred mis-sion. God, country, revolution—all consecrated great plans. How can the secular, democratic politician, by comparison, not fail to look like some small-time office manager? In the best of cases we acknowledge in him the virtues of competence and integrity, but how can these justify the exorbitant pretension that he inherits, willingly or not, of raising himself above the ordinary run of morals in order to serve as their guide?
By default, therefore, politicians choose to try to stay in power. And since we live in a democracy, they will do so using every means allowed by this kind of regime. Without having seen it coming, in the past few years we have entered the age of politics as a technique, in the philosophical sense, a search for ways to increase the means of power to the detriment of any reflection on its ends, an art of mastery for the sake of mastery, of domination for the sake of domination.
Luc Ferry (2002:123,124) Man Made God: The Meaning of Life. ISBN 978 0226 244846. (vertaling uit het Frans; het citaat is geredigeerd)