In one book, the heroine gradually receives nickname “Offthehook” because that’s how she introduces herself all the time: “I’m off the hook.” But is should be clear that none of us is completely “with no commitment”. Indeed, it is almost an exact translation. This use is established already in ancient Greece. Prometheus was chained to a rock, obligatus, just as someone is bound with an oath.

And as far as services of public interest are concerned, They are the activities which create the infrastructure for human relations and everyday activities. Many of the services are activities which we used to ensure ourselves, bound with each other by strong interpersonal relationships. With increasing specialization of activities and employment, the state takes them over. Then they reflect in the obligatory state budget expenditure, i.e. expenses by which the state is bound, just like Prometheus on the rock, who is thus at the mercy of birds. The birds come, the myth reports, the vulture for example likes Prometheus’ liver. However, as regards the budget, there are different birds coming, and they are grateful for anything.

A citizen who thinks services of public interest are not of his concern elects once in a while his representatives to the representative offices and relies on them to take the task of chasing the birds away and saving the state, of changing the state from a carcass to something prospering, unbounded. Oddly enough, this model does not work. This is because services of public interest aren’t only of the state’s interest and can be used (and not abused) only if people show personal interest and knowledge. In this regard, it is especially true that nothing can be done by itself. We can paraphrase Masaryk’s quotations that “states are kept by ideas with which they arose,” as follows: social mechanisms and tools only work if the people in the given environment perceive them as "their own" and take them seriously. Services of public interest which turn into something foreign, external, i.e. services that are matters of the state do not work; they are ineffective and ultimately not helpful to those who need such help.