Conclusion

Now, comrades, now is the time to decide to change sides. We must shake off the great mantle of night which has enveloped us, and reach for the light. The new day which is dawning must find us determined, enlightened and resolute. We must abandon our dreams and say farewell to our beliefs and former friendships. Let us not lose time in useless laments or sickening mimicry. Let us leave this Europe which never stops talking of man yet massacres him at everyone of its street corners, at every corner of the world. For centuries Europe has brought the progress of other men to a halt and enslaved them for its own purposes and glory; for centuries it has stifled virtually the whole of humanity in the name of a so-called "spiritual adventure." Look at it now teeter ing between atomic destruction and spiritual disintegration. And yet nobody can deny its achievements at home have not been crowned with success. Europe has taken over leadership of the world with fervor, cynicism, and violence. And look how the shadow of its monu ments spreads and multiplies. Every movement Europe makes bursts the boundaries of space and thought. Europe has denied itself not only humility and modesty but also solicitude and tenderness.

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Its only show of miserliness has been toward man, only to ward man has it shown itself to be niggardly and murderously carmvorous. So, my brothers, how could we fail to understand that we have better things to do than follow in that Europe's footsteps? This Europe, which never stopped talking ofman, which never stopped proclaiming its sole concern was man, we now know the price of suffering humanity has paid for everyone of its spiritual victories. Come, comrades, the European game is finally over, we must look for something else. We can do anything today provided we do not ape Europe, provided we are not obsessed with catching up with Europe. Europe has gained such a mad and reckless momentum that it has lost control and reason and is heading at dizzying speed towards the brink from which we would be advised to remove ourselves as quickly as possible. It is all too true, however, that we need a model, schemas and examples. For many of us the European model is the most elat ing. But we have seen in the preceding pages how misleading such an imitation can be. European achievements, European technology and European lifestyles must stop tempting us and leading us astray. When I look for man in European lifestyles and technology I see a constant denial of man, an avalanche of murders. Man's condition, his projects and collaboration with others on tasks that strengthen man's totality, are new issues which require genuine inspiration. Let us decide not to imitate Europe and let us tense our muscles and our brains in a new direction. Let us endeavor to invent a man in full, something which Europe has been inca pable of achieving. Two centuries ago, a former European colony took it into its head to catch up with Europe. It has been so successful that the United States ofAmerica has become a monster where the flaws,

sickness, and inhumanity of Europe have reached frightening proportions. Comrades, have we nothing else to do but create a third Eu rope? The West saw itself on a spiritual adventure. It is in the name of the Spirit, meaning the spirit of Europe, that Europe justified its crimes and legitimized the slavery in which it held four fifths of humanity. Yes, the European spirit is built on strange foundations. The whole of European thought developed in places that were in creasingly arid and increasingly inaccessible. Consequently, it was natural that the chances of encountering man became less and less frequent. A permanent dialogue with itself, an increasingly obnoxious narcissism inevitably paved the way for a virtual delirium where intellectual thought turns into agony since the reality of man as a living, working, self-made being is replaced by words, an assemblage of words and the tensions generated by their mean ings. There were Europeans, however, who urged the European workers to smash this narcissism and break with this denial of reality. Generally speaking, the European workers did not respond to the call. The fact was that the workers believed they too were part of the prodigious adventure of the European Spirit. All the elements for a solution to the major problems of hu manity existed at one time or another in European thought. But the Europeans did not act on the mission that was designated them and which consisted of virulently pondering these ele ments, modifying their configuration, their being, of changing them and final1y taking the problem of man to an infinitely higher plane. Today we are witnessing a stasis of Europe. Comrades, let us flee this stagnation where dialectics has gradually turned into a logic of the status quo. Let us reexamine the question of man. Let us reexamine the question of cerebral reality, the brain mass humanity in its entirety whose affinities must be increased,

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whose connections must be diversified and whose communica tions must be humanized again. Come brothers, we have far too much work on our hands to revel in outmoded games. Europe has done what it had to do all things considered, it has done a good job; let us stop ac cusing it, but let us say to it firmly it must stop putting on such a show. We no longer have reason to fear it, let us stop then envy ing it. Third World is today facing Europe as one colossal mass and solve the problems this Europe whose project must be to was incapable of finding the answers to. But what matters now is not a question of profitability, not a question of increased productivity, not a question of production rates. No, it is not a question of back to nature. It is the very question of not dragging man in directions which mutilate him, not imposing on his brain tempos that rapidly obliterate and it. The notion of catching up must not be as a pretext to brutalize man, to tear him from himself and his inner consciousness, to break him, to kill him. we do not want to catch up with anyone. But what we want is to walk in the company of man, every man, night and day, for all times. It is not a question of stringing the caravan out where groups are spaced so far apart they cannot see the one in front, men who no longer recognize each other, meet less and less and talk to each other less and less. The Third World must start over a new history of man takes account of not only the occasional prodigious theses main tained by Europe but also its crimes, the most heinous of which have been committed at the very heart of man, the pathological dismembering of his functions and the erosion of his unity, and the context of the community, the fracture, the stratification the bloody tensions fed by class, and finally, on the immense scale of humanity, the racial hatred, slavery, exploitation and, above all, the bloodless genocide whereby one and a half billion men have been written off.

So comrades, let us not pay tribute to Europe by creating states, institutions, and societies that draw their inspiration from it. Humanity expects other things from us than this grotesq ue and generally obscene emulation. Ifwe want to transform Africa into a new Europe, America into a new Europe, then let us entrust the destinies of our countries to the Europeans. They will do a better job than the best of us. But if we want humanity to take one step forward, if we want to take it to another level than the one where Europe has placed it, then we must innovate, we must be pioneers. If we want to respond to the expectations of our peoples, we must look elsewhere besides Europe. Moreover, if we want to respond to the expectations of the Europeans we must not send them back a reflection, however ideal, of their society and their thought that periodically sickens even them. For Europe, for ourselves and for humanity, comrades, we must make a new start, develop a new way of thinking, and en deavor to create a new man.

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