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"The necessary consequence of man's right to life is his right to self-defense. In a civilized society, force may be used only in retaliation and onl… - Ayn Rand
"The necessary consequence of man's right to life is his right to self-defense. In a civilized society, force may be used only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use. All the reasons which make the initiation of physical force an evil, make the retaliatory use of physical force a moral imperative.
If some "pacifist" society renounced the retaliatory use of force, it would be left helplessly at the mercy of the first thug who decided to be immoral. Such a society would achieve the opposite of its intention: instead of abolishing evil, it would encourage and reward it."
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About Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand (2 February 1905 – 6 March 1982) was a Russian-born American novelist, philosopher, playwright, and screenwriter. She is known for her bestselling novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, and for developing a philosophical system called Objectivism.
Biography information from Wikiquote
Also Known As
Birth Name:
Alisa Zinovyevna Rosenbaum
Alternative Names:
Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum
•
Alice O'Connor
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When one acts on pity against justice, it is the good whom one punishes for the sake of the evil; when one saves the guilty from suffering, it is the innocent whom one forces to suffer. There is no escape from justice, nothing can be unearned and unpaid for in the universe, neither in matter nor in spirit — and if the guilty do not pay, then the innocent have to pay it.
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