Buckley begins with an anecdote about a time he was riding in a train in winter time. It was below freezing outside but was 30°C inside the train car. Everybody was sweating yet when the train conductor came around for tickets not a single person mentioned the temperature. When Buckley stopped the conductor to attempt to question why it was so hot, the train passengers glared at him as if to say, “what question could be so important as to justify my sibilant intrusion into his [the conductors] stupor?” Buckley continues to say that it isn’t just the people on the train that “have given up trying to rectify irrational vexations but the American people everywhere”. He goes into another personal anecdote in which this time he is at the movies with his wife. The picture is out of focus yet nobody informs management. The people up front believe the people at the rear would do the job seeing they are closer. Others believe that someone connected to management would inform them. After the show everybody went on with their business without filing a complaint. …show more content…
A worker at a ski resort is sitting around chatting when there is a long line of people waiting. Buckley wants a screw driver to tighten a binding. When he confronts him he is informed that the worker, Jiggs, had just recovered from a heart attack and should not be moving. Moments later Jiggs was airlifted to a hospital. Buckley returned to the line full of men glaring at him. Buckley concludes that “with the technification of life goes our direct responsibility for our material environment, and we are conditioned to adopt a position of helplessness