wretched-of-the-earth-frantz-fanon

136THE WRETCHED OF THE EARTHTHE TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS OF NATIONAL CONSCIOUSNESS 137!~to conduct an information campaign. The people must understandwhat is at stake. Public business must be the business ofWe arrive therefore at the need to increase the numrankand file. All too often we arecontent with establishmg national bodies such as the Women'sUnion, the Youth Movement, and the Labor Unions at the topand never outside the capital. But if we venture to investigatebehind the offices in the capital, if we go through to the backroomwhere the records are meant to be, we are aghast at the void, theemptiness, and the bluff. We need a foundation, cells that providesubstance and dynamism. The masses must be able to meet,discuss, put forward suggestions and receive instructions. Citizensmust have the opportunity to speak, to express themselvesinnovate. meeting of the local cell or the committeeis a liturgical act. It is a privileged opportunity for theto listen and speak. At every meeting the brain multipliesthe association of ideas and the eye discovers a widerpanorama.The high percentage of young people in the underdevelopedcountries poses specific problems for the government that mustbe addressed lucidly. The idle and often illiterate urban youthis exposed to all kinds of disrupting infl uences. Youth in theunderdeveloped countries is in most cases marketed entertainmentfrom the industrialized countries. As a rule there is somebetween the mental and material level of a societyit provides. In the underdeveloped countries,however, the young generation has access to entertainmentdevised for the youth of the capitalist countries: detective stories,slot machines, hard-core photos, pornographic literature, R-ratedfilms and, above all, alcohol. In the West, the family environment,school, and the relatively high standard of living of theworking masses, serve as a kind of bulwark against the harmfuleffects of this entertainment. But in an African country whereintellectual development is unequal, where the violent clash oftwo worlds has seriouslyrupted ways ofthinking, theAfrican are at the mercy of the aggression contained in Westernculture. His family very often proves incapable of counteractingthis violence with stability and homogeneity.In this area the government must serve as filter and stabilizer.commissioners for youth in the underdeveloped countriesmake one mistake. They see their role as equivalentcommissioners for youth in the developed countries.soul, developing the body, and encouragingtalent in sports. In our opinion, they should be waryideas. The youth of an underdeveloped country is often anyouth. It must first of all be occupied. This is why the commissionerfor youth must report to the Ministry for Labor. The Ministryfor Labor, which is a requirement for an underdevelopedcountry, works in close collaboration with the Ministry for Plananotherrequirement in an underdeveloped country. Theof Africa should not be oriented toward the stadiums buttoward the fields, the fields and the schools. The stadium is notan urban showpiece but a rural space that is cleared, worked, andoffered to the nation. The capitalist notion of sports is fundamentallydifferent from that which should exist in an underdevelonedcountry. The African politician should not be concernedproducing professional sportsmen, but conscious individuals whoalso practice sports. Ifsports are not incorporated into the life ofthe nation, i.e., in the building of the nation, if we produce nationalsportsmen instead of conscious individuals, then sports willquickly be ruined by professionalism and commercialism. A sportshould not be a game or entertainment for the urban bourgeoisie.Our greatest task is to constantly understand what is happeningin our own countries. We must not cultivate the spirit of theexceptional or look for the hero. another form of leader. We mustelevate the people, expandate them, and humanize them.