Franz Fanon/Foo Questing

[Copabanana]

These quotes seem relevant to understanding our families and the process of changing ourselves and understanding what has happened. The political views expressed are not what is being endorsed here. The quotes are from Goodreads.

Frantz Fanon > Quotes

Frantz Fanon quotes (showing 1-30 of 106)
“Sometimes people hold a core belief that is very strong. When they are
presented with evidence that works against that belief, the new
evidence cannot be accepted. It would create a feeling that is
extremely uncomfortable, called cognitive dissonance. And because it
is so important to protect the core belief, they will rationalize,
ignore and even deny anything that doesn't fit in with the core belief.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“To speak a language is to take on a world, a culture.”
― Frantz Fanon

“Each generation must discover its mission, fulfill it or betray it, in relative opacity.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth


“The oppressed will always believe the worst about themselves.”
― Frantz Fanon

“For a colonized people the most essential value, because the most concrete, is first and foremost the land: the land which will bring them bread and, above all, dignity.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

“Imperialism leaves behind germs of rot which we must clinically detect and remove from our land but from our minds as well.”
― Frantz Fanon

“O my body, make of me always a man who questions!”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“In the World through which I travel, I am endlessly creating myself.”
― Frantz Fanon

“Everything can be explained to the people, on the single condition that you want them to understand.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

“When we revolt it’s not for a particular culture. We revolt simply because, for many reasons, we can no longer breathe”
― Frantz Fanon

“Today I believe in the possibility of love; that is why I endeavor to trace its imperfections, its perversions.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“What matters is not to know the world but to change it.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“Each generation must, out of relative obscurity, discover its mission, fulfill it, or betray it.”

“Two centuries ago, a former European colony decided to catch up with Europe. It succeeded so well that the United States of America became a monster, in which the taints, the sickness and the inhumanity of Europe have grown to appalling dimensions”
― Frantz Fanon

“The Negro enslaved by his inferiority, the white man enslaved by his superiority alike behave in accordance with a neurotic orientation.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“Violence is man re-creating himself. ”
― Frantz Fanon

“Mastery of language affords remarkable power.”
― Frantz Fanon

“The unpreparedness of the educated classes, the lack of practical links between them and the mass of the people, their laziness, and, let it be said, their cowardice at the decisive moment of the struggle will give rise to tragic mishaps.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

“When people like me, they like me "in spite of my color." When they dislike me; they point out that it isn't because of my color. Either way, I am locked in to the infernal circle.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“The claim to a national culture in the past does not only rehabilitate that nation and serve as a justification for the hope of a future national culture. In the sphere of psycho-affective equilibrium it is responsible for an important change in the native. Perhaps we haven't sufficiently demonstrated that colonialism is not satisfied merely with holding a people in its grip and emptying the native's brain of all form and content. By a kind of perverted logic, it turns to the past of the oppressed people, and distorts, disfigures, and destroys it. This work of devaluing pre-colonial history takes on a dialectical significance today.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

“They realize at last that change does not mean reform, that change does not mean improvement.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

“Negrophobes exist. It is not hatred of the Negro, however, that motivates them; they lack the courage for that, or they have lost it. Hate is not inborn; it has to be constantly cultivated, to be brought into being, in conflict with more or less recognized guilt complexes. Hate demands existence and he who hates has to show his hate in appropriate actions and behavior; in a sense, he has to become hate. That is why Americans have substituted discrimination for lynching. Each to his own side of the street.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“When a bachelor of philosophy from the Antilles refuses to apply for certification as a teacher on the grounds of his color I say that philosophy has never saved anyone. When someone else strives and strains to prove to me that black men are as intelligent as white men I say that intelligence has never saved anyone: and that is true, for, if philosophy and intelligence are invoked to proclaim the equality of men, they have also been employed to justify the extermination of men.”
― Frantz Fanon

“I, the man of color, want only this: That the tool never possess the man. That the enslavement of man by man cease forever. That is, of one by another. That it be possible for me to discover and to love man, wherever he may be.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

“Zombies, believe me, are more terrifying than colonists.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

“A man who has a language consequently possesses the world expressed and implied by that language.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

“Negrophobes exist. It is not hatred of the Negro, however, that motivates them; they lack the courage for that, or they have lost it. Hate is not inborn; it has to be constantly cultivated, to be brought into being, in conflict with more or less recognized guilt complexes. Hate demands existence and he who hates has to show his hate in appropriate actions and behavior; in a sense, he has to become hate. That is why Americans have substituted discrimination for lynching. Each to his own side of the street.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

Quoting sentences I found relevant in light of FOO issues:

Hate is not inborn; it has to be constantly cultivated, to be brought into being, in conflict with more or less recognized guilt complexes.

Hate demands existence and he who hates has to show his hate in appropriate actions and behavior; in a sense, he has to become hate.

“The claim to a national culture in the past does not only rehabilitate that nation and serve as a justification for the hope of a future national culture. In the sphere of psycho-affective equilibrium it is responsible for an important change in the native. Perhaps we haven't sufficiently demonstrated that colonialism is not satisfied merely with holding a people in its grip and emptying the native's brain of all form and content. By a kind of perverted logic, it turns to the past of the oppressed people, and distorts, disfigures, and destroys it. This work of devaluing pre-colonial history takes on a dialectical significance today.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

I liked everything about this quote. In FOO speak, the writer is describing family identity. It isn't enough for them to have enslaved us, not enough for them to have held us in their grips and emptied our brains to fill it with the roles we were hurt into living instead of real lives, instead of our lives. Distortion, disfigurement, destruction of what is real about the past.

"What would Cedar do."

“The unpreparedness of the educated classes, the lack of practical links between them and the mass of the people, their laziness, and, let it be said, their cowardice at the decisive moment of the struggle will give rise to tragic mishaps.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

Yep. We are educating ourselves, now. No more cowardice at decisive moments, not in our actions, and not in our thinking.

Yay.

“The Negro enslaved by his inferiority, the white man enslaved by his superiority alike behave in accordance with a neurotic orientation.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

True. Takes two to play: One to tell lies, and one to believe them. We don't even have to be present though, as noted in the first quote, eventually the hater will have to fire something off to validate the grandiosity hatred justifies. I do believe grandiosity addiction is at the heart of it, is the reward in it for our sibs. Of course that was the truth in it for our mothers.

Who would have expected it in a sibling? It must have to do with the pseudo mom role.

Good. I am sick of being her mom.

And if I were her mom? We would have a nice, long discussion about lying and liars and people walking with the Lord to justify self righteous fanaticism. (I am so name calling, today. I suppose I should stop that.)

“Mastery of language affords remarkable power.”
― Frantz Fanon

It does.

:O)

Cedar

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

“The claim to a national culture in the past does not only rehabilitate that nation and serve as a justification for the hope of a future national culture. In the sphere of psycho-affective equilibrium it is responsible for an important change in the native. Perhaps we haven't sufficiently demonstrated that colonialism is not satisfied merely with holding a people in its grip and emptying the native's brain of all form and content. By a kind of perverted logic, it turns to the past of the oppressed people, and distorts, disfigures, and destroys it. This work of devaluing pre-colonial history takes on a dialectical significance today.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

One of my mom's more outrageous actions during the months after my father's death was her repeated assertion that with everyone dead, the stories were hers to tell.

Shortly thereafter, she began researching old newspapers to substantiate a story disparaging my paternal grandmother.

Cedar

 

[Copabanana]

Shortly thereafter, she began researching old newspapers to substantiate a story disparaging my paternal grandmother.

I guess that is why my sister wanted all of the pictures.

It is disturbing. She believes she owns it. She believes hers is the only voice. That is why she wanted her 3rd husband to meet me. To pin me down and define me, to him. It was a voyage of a Conquistador. To bring back tomatoes and squash and pumpkins and gold and gold and women in indigenous dress.* To the real world. The only one that mattered.

*Frieda Kahlo had a friendship and affair with Trotsky who later invited her to Paris. She accepted and when she arrived, she saw that he wanted her for display. As something romantic and novel and uniquely indigenous. He wanted her there to possess her as an object.

This is the intent of my sister with me.

I am getting so mad. I wish I had more pictures of me through my life. I hated getting my picture taken. I was beautiful *at least to a few people. My sister has the only ones.

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

You are not going to believe this Copa?

But my sister has all the pictures from FOO. At my sister's request, she and my mother intended to make a family album on DVD with copies for each of the sibs. That would have been seven years ago, now.

No copies have been made.

Serenity, does your sister have the pictures, too?

Cedar

 

[Copabanana]

But my sister has all the pictures from FOO. At my sister's request, she and my mother intended to make a family album on DVD with copies for each of the sibs.

This enrages me.

There was a picture of my mother from when she about 17 or so. A glamour shot. I know my sister would have stolen it off the wall (had her husband take it when he entered the house.) But it was central on a wall, and she had brains enough to know she would be implicated in taking something so visible.

So, when we were at the walk through with the attorney and sister's proxy, her husband, she (on phone with him) wanted to make a copy of said picture which she would copy and send to me. I said, No. The attorney will copy the picture and send it to you. i knew the picture would never again be seen.

The she wrote a letter about her devastation...just pure devastation to learn the family pictures were missing (and all along they were with her.)

These people.

PS Needless to say I am sorry about the pictures, Cedar. Our memories are our memories. We own those. Better those than pictures. Pictures can lie. Sisters too.

You know the thing is, I can recall very, very few lies in my life. In the few times I lied it was because of intense shame.

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

I don't mind about the pictures, Copa. I didn't like my sister's piggishness about it, but then, I never do. When I see my brother when he was little, I remember the traumatic things: Meeting the eyes of the little boy with excrement on his face. Hearing that tone I hope no one else have ever had to hear, when the one being abused understands no help is coming, and you are not big enough to help yourself to stop it. So, you get up and stand there, and it is night. And your father is not there.

And that keys in all kinds of other wake up in the middle of the night things.

He was such a sweet thing, my brother.

My mother was so big.

We are working with the sisters, now. I am happy about that. I have suffered too, over my sister's betrayals. It is good to see them for what they are.

Your sister was gaslighting you, Copa. The best thing for all of us is to find the role enslavement. Those feelings surrounding the emails are prime examples of what that was for you, Copa.

And for me.

Tomorrow, I will post something I found about sorrow and how to address it.

Because no matter how much I pretend it doesn't bother me, it does. I just don't know whether I am angry or disgusted or what.

Cedar


But I do know I am determined to come through this as myself.

That much, I do know.

 

[Copabanana]

Gaslighting or gas-lighting is a form of mental abuse in which information is twisted or spun, selectively omitted to favor the abuser, or false information is presented with the intent of making victims doubt their own memory, perception, and sanity.

So, this is the concept that eventually I will put between the stimulus and the feelings. Even in memories. I am still responding because I am still responding. I can remember "gaslighting" each time before I respond, and no longer react to her attempts to hurt me.

I want to write here, still, "why does she do it?" But I know why.

My Mother asked me something similar in the weeks before she died, "why is she like that, ____" (insert my real name here, please, in the diminutive form. Copa will not do.)

They do it, because they do it. They look for the result in us. We comply or not. That is the lesson.

Thank you, Cedar.

 

[BusynMember]

I am getting so mad. I wish I had more pictures of me through my life. I hated getting my picture taken. I was beautiful *at least to a few people. My sister has the only ones.

Copa, this is one time I think you and M. should confront her together to give you your pictures back. They are yours and rightfully should be passed along to your son. What does SHE need t hem for?

As I've said before, in my 30's, when I was first rejecting my FOO, especially mother and sister during the first cut off, I tossed all my picture books until my teen years into the garbage can. I didn't mind being in pictures. I just hated the people who were in the pictures with me, except, at the time, my brother, who I still don't hate.

As for those quotes, I loved them. All of them. Much to ponder in every single one regarding our FOO. What a wise, wise man.

 

[BusynMember]

We comply or not. That is the lesson.

Wow.
Just when I thought I was all done with insight I got another layer just now.

Like my mother before her, my sister gets angry when I don't comply to her wishes. Although I do not break the law or go crazy disregarding social norms, there are some formalities that I think are silly and don't follow and she takes that personally. If she can't control me, she gets angry at me. Thank you. Now I just peeled another layer off t he onion.

Why do they need to control so badly? It's like t he Daphne thing. Well, yeah, I wish she hadn't done it, but more than anything else I'm just shaking my head. She made a fool out of herself in my opinion, not me. So big deal. She can be a fool if she likes.

Why does she think that what I do, that she may feel is inappropriate (whether or not anyone else does) bother her so much that she feels the need to think it reflects on HER?

Do you feel that what others do reflect on you?

I am more apt to think that way about my kids than my sister. But even with kids...once they are grown, they make their own choices and if they are not good ones, I certainly didn't tell them to do it. Know what I mean? Am I making any sense? I'm pretty tired from the carnival and bidding farewell to my precious daughter...

 

[Copabanana]

Why do they need to control so badly? It's like t he Daphne thing.

There are two parts to my thinking right now over this.

My sister needs control over everything. When she has an upcoming vacation she plans hour by hour 6 months in advance where she will go.

The other part is with respect to Daphne. She does not want to control you, in general, I do not think. She wants to control you with respect to her. She wants to be able to reject or accept you. And worse she wants to control whether you accept and reject yourself and whether others accept or reject you, and how they think about you.

Kind of like G-d. It is grandiose for sure. She must be seeking to repeat what she saw your mother do. She must be trying as my sister did, to gaslight me, to evoke the same sense of isolation, confusion and sense of utter dependency and helplessness we had as children.

She does this because she feels this inside of herself, no control whatsoever. It is like the hot potato. She is trying to stun you so that you forget and accept it.

She is lost without you. She feels abandoned. She feels bereft and helpless. She feels she has lost a part of herself. Most of all she feels rage. Because you are beyond her control. All she can do is want to and try to hurt you, to punish you for abandoning her. That is what I think. I think there is great envy, too.

Why does she think that what I do, that she may feel is inappropriate (whether or not anyone else does) bother her so much that she feels the need to think it reflects on HER?

She does not think what you do is inappropriate. She is trying to put you down. She is using whatever she can think of to do so. If she thought you would react to accusations of being a one eyed purple people eater she would say that.

She is only copying what she saw your mother doing. She is trying to out-mean your mother.

She is crazy mad because you left her circle by not complying with her rules. She is punishing you so that you will come back. And punishing you because you have not. She is exercising what may to her seem like power. (Maybe if you are 9 to 13 years old it looks like power, but she does not realize how juvenile she seems. I think she sounded like one of those cyber bully girls who bullied the girl into suicide. That is what I think of her.)

Teen-age brains are not developed. You know that. I will not spell it out further with respect to your sister...but there is something going on there. Something about her lack of self-control, her rage, her lack of insight and her belief that she can control you absolutely...and can determine what you deserve or not. I do not know why I thought of Anne Perry (ask me later if you want) but I did. I will not censor myself here, in case there is a reason.

I do not think it would be good for you, Serenity, to ever see your sister again. I fear that you and your your family would be unsafe.

 

[Copabanana]

“Today I believe in the possibility of love; that is why I endeavor to trace its imperfections, its perversions.”
― Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

This is the quote I wish I had used to respond to Daphne.

 

[BusynMember]

She wont see us again, copa, thanks for caring. I can handle it now that I see it.

Copa, she left. I just decided it was the last time and that I am done. She is very puzzling and I am done. Done trying to really figure out why.

I am so glad we posted our hearts here. It trivialized my mother and the rest of foo in my life. Actually sharing it shrunk it.

Daphne helped. It reminded me.

I am free of that now.

I wont play.

You dont have to play either.

Nobody owns us.

I have things to look forward to that dont matter whether she likes or hates me. It doesnt affect me either way.

Did I tell you that me. Jumper and her boyfriend are going to see princess and bb in a few weeks?
Those things matter.

Love you both.

 

[Copabanana]

Did I tell you that me. Jumper and her boyfriend are going to see princess and bb in a few weeks?
Those things matter.

Yes.