Essence and Existence
XIII
By Franz J.
T. Lee
4th
November, 1999
Frantz Omar Fanon: Part III
SCENE: Philosophy Seminar
(Coseino gives his lecture, underlining the scientific parameters a n d philosophic paradigms of Praxis a n d Theory, indicating the limits of Formal Logic, Dialectics, Unilogic and Dialogic. He also indicates how each one of them forms specific "historic" barriers, which not only had demarcated the "conscience" and "consciousness" of Hegel, Marx, Darwin, Freud. Jung or Fanon, but which also blindfolds us, here and now, blackening our "visions" with racist and ideological fog and smog, preventing us to act, to understand, to think, to fathom the very Essence a n d Existence AND Transcendence of our contemporary livelihood. Then, transhistorically, as deja vu, as fata morgana, as a bolt from the blue, Fanon triumphantly appears on the scene again.)
Coseino: Before we proceed, Karl still wants to comment something with reference to our previous classes on Negritude, Racism and Colonialism. He wants to emphasize a relevant aspect of Racism which was not dealt with in previous classes: The omnipresent destructive forces of "racism"; also the historic "peculiarities" within Colonialism. Go ahead, Karl!
Karl: Racism has often been destructive to its practitioners even though they may not realize it. Racism makes long-term enemies of the colonized, which has been quite destructive.
Albert: Please, Karl, give us a historic perspective of your most intrepid statement.
Karl: From a historical perspective, a main result of the Versailles Treaty after World War I was that the European colonizers increased its colonization of Africa and the Middle East, betraying the colonized who fought on their side. Mussolini attacked Ethiopia in the 1930’s; in part, because he felt that Italy, a victor in the war, was cheated of colonies at Versailles.
Albert: From an imperialist point of view, this was intriguing indeed!
Karl: Later, during World War II, various "Third World" nationalists were waiting for this inter-imperialist conflict to weaken the European powers, then they would struggle to break up the colonial empires. This happened when the war ended. In fact, during World War II, not all Third World nationalists fought on the side of the Allies. Some fought on the side of Hitler, e.g., Bose in India and Rashid Ali (Moslem Brotherhood) in Iraq. In Vichy France, a black African served in its Parliament. The same applies to Senghor of Senegal. Consequently, Allied racists were pitted vs. Nazi racists. In addition, Ho Chi Minh remained neutral until the Japanese left Vietnam after World War II. Then he fought the Vichy French in Vietnam.
Furthermore, prior to World War II, Moorish soldiers from Spanish Morocco fought on the side of Franco’s Nationalists. I think that this resulted in some measure of independence for Spanish Morocco. Sometimes, anticolonialist achievements come from unexpected sources.
Albert: Thanks, for illustrating to us the "racist" contradictions within colonialism itself. This is surely an academic enrichment, always to remember to study all sides of the same coin of Racism, of Capitalism. Irene and Renate, we are dying of curiosity to hear what revolutionary "message" Frantz Fanon left as emancipatory legacy to all "Wretched of the Earth".
Renate: This "message" has to do with the "Question of Violence". As Sorel had already indicated, the "colonized" did not discover social violence, they were born into "colonial, capitalist violence". This, even Marx, in a footnote to "Capital" has confirmed: "If Money, according to Augier, was born into this world, with natural bloodstains all over its cheek, then Capital saw light, blood and dirt dripping from all its pores, from head to toe."
Irene: One should really not read Marx's Capital before breakfast!
Bill: To calm you down, Irene, I will order you a "Bloody Mary" from the Internet Bar.
Irene: I prefer a "Black & White" on the barbarian "Cave Rocks"!
Renate: Let me first relate Fanon's personal attitude to violence, pain, illness and emancipation, his self-devotion, and all these have nothing to do with any "conspiratorial theory" of the Illuminati. In 1960, when he knew that he had leukaemia, Fanon did not especially protect himself from the colonialist violent dangers involved surrounding his work in the liberation movement. He was conscious of his fatal illness, but realizing his emancipatory task he did not spare himself. Let us see, how he acquired this illness!
Once, on the Moroccan-Algerian frontier, the French "CIA", the Algerian pieds noirs, blew up the car in which he was riding. Strange enough, he escaped death, living thereafter with twelve fractured spinal vertebrae. The lower half of his body was partially paralysed. He was flown to Rome, and even there an attempt was made on his life. All these attempted assassinations had resulted in his illness, in leukaemia, in the cutting short of his life. Now, he was convinced of the brutal, violent determination of his colonial, capitalist enemies. And his message was clear: "an eye for an eye, a vertebrate for a vertebrate"! Emancipatory Violence! Violent Self-Defence of the Colonized! This life experience generated the philosophic contents of his famous book, of the classic, of "The Wretched of the Earth".
Around March, 1961, in Rome, Fanon consulted with Sartre to write an introduction to his book. His colleagues advised him to go to the USA for treatment, but Fanon was very reluctant to enter the lion's den. At last, illness forced him to succumb, and in November, in a hospital in Washington D.C., he was reading the proofs of his coming book. However, his leukaemia reached a critical stage, and he died there.
Coseino: What an international, ideological, "crocodile tear" carnival was organized around the deaths of Mother Theresa, Lady Di and JFK Jr.! May they forever "rest in peace"! The bourgeoisie really knows how to consecrate the heroes of its globalized system! At least, we are resurrecting, are transcending our everliving Frantz !
Irene: However, if the essential part of Fanon's book was emancipatory violence, the existential section dealt with the theoretical, philosophic explanation of colonialism and neo-colonialism in all parts of the globe: its corruption, intrigues, conspiracies, genocide, manipulation, indoctrination, mind control. Fanon, to liberate Algeria, Africa and the rest of the "Third World", individually and socially, advocated self-defence, revolutionary counter-violence, as remedy of all the psychological and physical damage caused by colonialism and imperialism on a global scale.
Renate: It must, however, be explained, why Fanon arrived at this radical solution. Leaving his personal experiences aside for the moment, which are already sufficient to arrive at such "radical" conclusions, his emancipatory thesis, as expressed in his notion of the cathartic effect of counter-violence, of this "cleansing force", of this "royal pardon", was, that decolonization could not be victorious, if the "wretched" did not seize political power from the "colonizers", by means of a violent liberation struggle, if every individual did not participate in this healing process, to expunge her/himself from the evils of colonialism and imperialism, from the sado-masochistic relations, inferiority complexes, auto-aggression, envy of colonial privileges, of master and servant relations, of the slave mentality, etc. Here, he insisted that everyone must take a bite in the bitter apple, to discover the proof by eating the sour colonial racist pudding all by oneself.
Irene: Fanon described our colonized world as a manichean reality, as a compartmentalized structure. He criticized Marxism, which did not analyse and which failed to include the "wretched classes" in its emancipatory theory. In "For the African Revolution", Fanon explained specific elements of the application of his theory of counter-violence, of organizing the liberation struggle. However, in our class we have already dealt with the most important aspects.
Coseino: Thank you, Irene and Renate, for a brilliant exposition. I read your respective books "Frantz Fanon: A Critical Study" and "L 'Oeuvre de Fanon"; I warmly recommend these works to all our students for further studies. As always, we have to be on our way! Till next time!
(The class begins to dissolve itself. Outside, mortars explode. Some students are protesting against the miserable conditions of life. A Coca-Cola truck goes up in flames. Tear-gas enters the hall. Certainly, this is not what Fanon meant, what he taught! Very cautiously the students of philosophy leave the classroom.)
