Concering Violence
by Shelly Schoeneshoefer

Göran Hugo Olsson, Sweden

Concerning violence consists of nine scenes from the Anti-Imperialistic Self-defence which is defined in a book entitled The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon. Fanon was born a gentleman on the island of Martinique; he travelled to France and soon realized that his privileged class meant nothing in the eyes of the Great French Empire since he was a black man and was surrounded by a colony of masters. This was the beginning of his quest to understand the philosophy behind these colonization attitudes and the results thereof.

Fanon travelled to Africa and had a hard look at what was transpiring there. This film takes a look at the Freedom Fighters of Mozambique and Angola as we see them freeing themselves from enslavement by their colonial masters. The audience is forced to see horrifying images along with interviews of Europeans (both missionaries as well as companies with resource investments) living in Africa who explain why they think that they are above them and are saving them while at the same time handling them as slaves. Fanon also sees that, after they free themselves from the colonizing nation, they often fall into civil war. It seems that colonization shakes the underlying structures that were in place for thousands of years and the people have lost the sense of freedom. The end result is violence leading to violence. We, as a European nation, including both Canada and The United States, have to change our attitude on robbing and using Africa as our resource. Director Olsson leads us to a question which even Fanon did not have the answer. How do we plan to change this path of destruction so that we all have a better future?