title: Frantz Fanon

text: In the course of his work as a physician and psychiatrist, Fanon supported Algeria's War of independence from France and was a member of the Algerian National Liberation Front.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon has been described as "the most influential anticolonial thinker of his time". For more than five decades, the life and works of Fanon have inspired national-liberation movements and other radical political organizations in Palestine, Sri Lanka, South Africa, and the United States. He formulated a model for community psychology, believing that many mental-health patients would do better if they were integrated into their family and community instead of being treated with institutionalized care. He also helped found the field of institutional psychotherapy while working at Saint-Alban under Francois Tosquelles and Jean Oury.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon published numerous books, including "The Wretched of the Earth" (1961). This influential work focuses on what he believed is the necessary role of violence by activists in conducting decolonization struggles.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Frantz Fanon was born on the Caribbean island of Martinique, which was then a French colony and is now a French single territorial collectivity. His father, Félix Casimir Fanon, was a descendant of African slaves, and worked as a customs agent. His mother, Eléanore Médélice, was of Afro-Martinican and white Alsatian descent, and worked as a shopkeeper. Frantz was the third of four sons in a family of eight children. Two of them died young, including his sister Gabrielle, with whom Frantz was very close. His family was socio-economically middle-class. They could afford the fees for the Lycée Schoelcher, at the time the most prestigious high school in Martinique, where Fanon came to admire one of the school's teachers, poet and writer Aimé Césaire. Fanon left Martinique in 1943, when he was 18 years old, in order to join the Free French forces.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: After France fell to the Nazis in 1940, Vichy French naval troops were blockaded on Martinique. Forced to remain on the island, French sailors took over the government from the Martiniquan people and established a collaborationist Vichy regime. In the face of economic distress and isolation under the blockade, they instituted an oppressive regime; Fanon described them as taking off their masks and behaving like "authentic racists". Residents made many complaints of harassment and sexual misconduct by the sailors. The abuse of the Martiniquan people by the French Navy influenced Fanon, reinforcing his feelings of alienation and his disgust with colonial racism. At the age of seventeen, Fanon fled the island as a "dissident" (a term used for Frenchmen joining Gaullist forces), traveling to Dominica to join the Free French Forces. After three attempts, he made it to Dominica, but it was too late to enlist. After the pro-Vichy Robert regime was deposed in Martinique in June 1943, Fanon returned to Fort-de-France to join the newly created, all black .


title: Frantz Fanon

text: He enlisted in the Free French army and joined an Allied convoy that reached Casablanca. He was later transferred to an army base at Béjaïa on the Kabylie coast of Algeria. Fanon left Algeria from Oran and served in France, notably in the battles of Alsace. In 1944 he was wounded at Colmar and received the "Croix de guerre". When the Nazis were defeated and Allied forces crossed the Rhine into Germany along with photojournalists, Fanon's regiment was "bleached" of all non-white soldiers. Fanon and his fellow Afro-Caribbean soldiers were sent to Toulon (Provence). Later, they were transferred to Normandy to await repatriation.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: During the war, Fanon was exposed to more white European racism. For example, European women liberated by black soldiers often preferred to dance with fascist Italian prisoners, rather than fraternize with their liberators.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In 1945, Fanon returned to Martinique. He lasted a short time there. He worked for the parliamentary campaign of his friend and mentor Aimé Césaire, who would be a major influence in his life. Césaire ran on the communist ticket as a parliamentary delegate from Martinique to the first National Assembly of the Fourth Republic. Fanon stayed long enough to complete his baccalaureate and then went to France, where he studied medicine and psychiatry.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon was educated in Lyon, where he also studied literature, drama and philosophy, sometimes attending Merleau-Ponty's lectures. During this period, he wrote three plays, of which two survive. After qualifying as a psychiatrist in 1951, Fanon did a residency in psychiatry at Saint-Alban-sur-Limagnole under the radical Catalan psychiatrist François Tosquelles, who invigorated Fanon's thinking by emphasizing the role of culture in psychopathology.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In France while completing his residency, Fanon wrote and published his first book, "Black Skin, White Masks" (1952), an analysis of the negative psychological effects of colonial subjugation upon black people. Originally, the manuscript was the doctoral dissertation, submitted at Lyon, entitled "Essay on the Disalienation of the Black", which was a response to the racism that Fanon experienced while studying psychiatry and medicine at university in Lyon; the rejection of the dissertation prompted Fanon to publish it as a book. For his doctor of philosophy degree, he submitted another dissertation of narrower scope and different subject. Left-wing philosopher Francis Jeanson, leader of the pro-Algerian independence Jeanson network, read Fanon's manuscript and as a senior book editor at Éditions du Seuil in Paris, gave the book its new title and wrote its epilogue.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: After receiving Fanon's manuscript at Seuil, Jeanson invited him to an editorial meeting. Amid Jeanson's praise of the book, Fanon exclaimed: "Not bad for a nigger, is it?" Insulted, Jeanson dismissed Fanon from his office. Later, Jeanson learned that his response had earned him the writer's lifelong respect, and Fanon acceded to Jeanson's suggestion that the book be entitled "Black Skin, White Masks".


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In the book, Fanon described the unfair treatment of black people in France and how they were disapproved of by white people. Black people also had a sense of inferiority when facing white people. Fanon believed that even though they could speak French, they could not fully integrate into the life and environment of white people. (See further discussion of "Black Skin, White Masks" under Work, below.)


title: Frantz Fanon

text: After his residency, Fanon practised psychiatry at Pontorson, near Mont Saint-Michel, for another year and then (from 1953) in Algeria. He was "chef de service" at the Blida-Joinville Psychiatric Hospital in Algeria. He worked there until his deportation in January 1957.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon's methods of treatment started evolving, particularly by beginning socio-therapy to connect with his patients' cultural backgrounds. He also trained nurses and interns. Following the outbreak of the Algerian revolution in November 1954, Fanon joined the Front de Libération Nationale, after having made contact with Dr Pierre Chaulet at Blida in 1955. Working at a French hospital in Algeria, Fanon became responsible for treating the psychological distress of the French soldiers and officers who carried out torture in order to suppress anti-colonial resistance. Additionally, Fanon was also responsible for treating Algerian torture victims.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon made extensive trips across Algeria, mainly in the Kabyle region, to study the cultural and psychological life of Algerians. His lost study of "The marabout of Si Slimane" is an example. These trips were also a means for clandestine activities, notably in his visits to the ski resort of Chrea which hid an FLN base.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: By summer 1956 Fanon realized that he could no longer continue to support French efforts, even indirectly via his hospital work. In November he submitted his ""Letter of resignation to the Resident Minister"", which later became an influential text of its own in anti-colonialist circles.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: There comes a time when silence becomes dishonesty. The ruling intentions of personal existence are not in accord with the permanent assaults on the most commonplace values. For many months my conscience has been the seat of unpardonable debates. And the conclusion is the determination not to despair of man, in other words, of myself. The decision I have reached is that I cannot continue to bear a responsibility at no matter what cost, on the false pretext that there is nothing else to be done.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Shortly afterwards, Fanon was expelled from Algeria and moved to Tunis where he joined the FLN openly. He was part of the editorial collective of "Al Moudjahid", for which he wrote until the end of his life. He also served as Ambassador to Ghana for the Provisional Algerian Government (GPRA). He attended conferences in Accra, Conakry, Addis Ababa, Leopoldville, Cairo and Tripoli. Many of his shorter writings from this period were collected posthumously in the book "Toward the African Revolution". In this book Fanon reveals war tactical strategies; in one chapter he discusses how to open a southern front to the war and how to run the supply lines.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Upon his return to Tunis, after his exhausting trip across the Sahara to open a Third Front, Fanon was diagnosed with leukemia. He went to the Soviet Union for treatment and experienced some remission of his illness. When he came back to Tunis once again, he dictated his testament "The Wretched of the Earth". When he was not confined to his bed, he delivered lectures to Armée de Libération Nationale (ALN) officers at Ghardimao on the Algerian-Tunisian border. He traveled to Rome for a three-day meeting with Jean-Paul Sartre who had greatly influenced his work. Sartre agreed to write a preface to Fanon's last book, "The Wretched of the Earth".


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In 1961, the CIA arranged a trip to the U.S. for further leukemia treatment at a National Institutes of Health facility. During his time in the United States, Fanon was handled by CIA agent Oliver Iselin.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon died in Bethesda, Maryland, on 6 December 1961, under the name of "Ibrahim Fanon", a Libyan "nom de guerre" he had assumed in order to enter a hospital in Rome after being wounded in Morocco during a mission for the Algerian National Liberation Front. He was buried in Algeria after lying in state in Tunisia. Later, his body was moved to a martyrs' ("Chouhada") graveyard at Aïn Kerma in eastern Algeria.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Frantz Fanon was survived by his French wife, Josie (née Dublé), their son, Olivier Fanon, and his daughter from a previous relationship, Mireille Fanon-Mendès France. Josie Fanon died by suicide in Algiers in 1989. Mireille became a professor of international law and conflict resolution and serves as president of the Frantz Fanon Foundation. Olivier became president of the Frantz Fanon National Association, which was created in Algiers in 2012.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: "Black Skin, White Masks" was first published in French as "Peau noire, masques blancs" in 1952 and is one of Fanon's most important works. In "Black Skin, White Masks," Fanon psychoanalyzes the oppressed Black person who is perceived to have to be a lesser creature in the White world that they live in, and studies how they navigate the world through a performance of White-ness. Particularly in discussing language, he talks about how the black person's use of a colonizer's language is seen by the colonizer as predatory, and not transformative, which in turn may create insecurity in the black's consciousness. He recounts that he himself faced many admonitions as a child for using Creole French instead of "real French", or "French French", that is, "white" French. Ultimately, he concludes that "mastery of language [of the white/colonizer] for the sake of recognition "as white" reflects a dependency that subordinates the black's humanity".


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Chapter 1 of "Black Skin, White Masks" is entitled "The Negro and Language". In this chapter, Fanon discusses how colored people were perceived by the whites. He says that the black man has two dimensions: One with his fellows, the other with the white man. A Negro behaves differently with a white man than with another Negro. Fanon claimed that whether this self-division is a direct result of colonialist subjugation is beyond question. To speak a language is to take on a world, a culture. The Antilles Negro who wants to be white will be the whiter as he gains greater mastery of the cultural tool that language is. Fanon concludes his theorizing by saying: "Historically, it must be understood that the Negro wants to speak French because it is the key that can open doors which were still barred to him fifty years ago. In the Antilles Negro who comes within this study we find a quest for subtleties, for refinements of language—so many further means of proving to himself that he has measured up to the culture."


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Chapter 2 of "Black Skin, White Masks" is entitled “The woman of color and the white man”. The focus of the chapter is on the extent to which authentic love between women of color and European males is hindered by unconscious tensions. It discusses how a feeling of inferiority has manifested in women of color because of colonialism. Fanon introduces the reader to the cases of Mayotte Capécia and Nini. Mayotte Capécia is a black woman who Fanon claims has idealized whiteness. She wants above all to be with a white man, and strives to be as close to communities of white people as possible. Fanon also discusses how mulatto women see themselves as superior to black men. This is the case with the black man Mactar´s love letter to Nini (a mulatto woman), where he acknowledges his inferiority as a black man, but argues that his devotion to her is reason enough to choose him. The idealization of whiteness both in white people and people of color is discussed.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Chapter 3 of "Black Skin, White Masks" is entitled “The man of color and the white woman”. In this chapter Fanon discusses the desire of the black man to be white. Firstly by telling the story of the Antillean man who upon arrival has one goal: to sleep with a white woman. For the black man, an unconscious need to prove that their worth is similar to the white man is fulfilled through sexual interaction with the white woman. Fanon then analyzes the story of Jean Veneuse written by René Maran, a work believed to be autobiographic. Jean Veneuse is a black man from the Antilles living in Bourdeaux. He is a part of the social and cultural elite and falls in love with a white woman. He is aware of the stereotype of the black man´s desire to sleep with a white woman and is therefore hesitant to become one of them thereby confirming the stereotype. Fanon goes on to explore the psychodynamics of Venuese´s personality type – the negative-aggressive abandonment-neurotic, and what role his personality type has in his romantic interactions. The negative-aggressive abandonment-neurotic displays a “fear of showing oneself as one actually is” resulting from a doubt that one can be loved as one is, as they had experiences of abandonment in childhood. Towards the end of the chapter, Fanon emphasizes the lack of generalizability for the findings on Jean Veneuse to the experiences of all black men in France, as the course of his development to a great extent is also part of his personality type. As Fanon writes “… we would like to think that we have discouraged any attempt to connect the failure of Jean Veneuse to the amount of melanin in his epidermis.”


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Chapter 4 of "Black Skin, White Masks" is entitled “The So-Called Dependency Complex of the Colonized”. The chapter envelopes Fanon´s critique of Octave Mannoni´s book “Prospero and Caliban: The Psychology of Colonization”. Mannoni launches a theory that the colonized Malagasies suffer from an inferiority complex which further leads to a dependency complex. Fanon criticizes the implication that this inferiority complex is innate in the colonized, and argues for the effect of human attitudes. He sees this complex as an effect of interactions in the colony: “The feelings of inferiority in the colonized are correlative to the feelings of superiority in the European… Let´s have the courage to say it upright. It is the racist who creates his inferior”, he writes. Mannoni is further criticized for not considering the Malagasies´ agency and ability to choose action for their own independence.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Chapter 5 of "Black Skin, White Masks" is entitled "The Fact of Blackness". In this chapter, Fanon tackles many theories. One theory he addresses is the different schema that are said to exist within a person, and how they exist differently for Black people. He talks about one's "bodily schema" (83), and theorizes that because of both the "historical-racial schema" (84),-- one that exists because of the history of racism and makes it so there is no one bodily-schema because of the context that comes with Blackness—and one's "epidermal-racial schema" (84), -- where Black people cannot be seen for their single bodily-schema because they are seen to represent their race and the history and therefore cannot be seen past their flesh—there is no universal Black schema. He describes this experience as "no longer a question of being aware of my body in the third person but in a triple person." Fanon concludes this theorizing by saying: "As long as the black man is among his own, he will have no occasion, except in minor internal conflicts, to experience his being through others."


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon also addresses Ontology, stating that it "—does not permit us to understand the being of the black man"(82). He says that because Blackness was created in, and continues to exist in, negation to whiteness, that ontology is not a philosophy that can be used to understand the Black experience. Fanon states that this ontology can't be used to understand the Black experience because it ignores the "lived experience". He argues that a black man has to be black, while also being black in relation to the white man.(90)


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Chapter 6 of "Black Skin, White Masks" is entitled "The Negro and Psychopathology". In this chapter, Fanon discussed how being Black can and does affect one's psyche. He makes it clear that the treatment of Black people causes emotional trauma. Fanon argues that as a result of one's skin color being Black, Black people are unable to truly process this trauma or "make it unconscious" (466). Black people are unable to not think about the fact that they are Black and all of the historical and current stigma that come with that. Fanon's work in this chapter specifically shows the short-comings of major names in psychology such as Sigmund Freud. However, Fanon repeatedly mentions the importance of Jacques Lacan's theory of language. Fanon discusses the mental health of Black people to show that "traditional" psychology was created and founded without thinking about Black people and their experiences.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Although Fanon wrote "Black Skin, White Masks" while still in France, most of his work was written in North Africa. It was during this time that he produced works such as "L'An Cinq, de la Révolution Algérienne" in 1959 ("Year Five of the Algerian Revolution"), later republished as "Sociology of a Revolution" and later still as "A Dying Colonialism". Fanon's original title was "Reality of a Nation"; however the publisher, François Maspero, refused to accept this title.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon is best known for the classic analysis of colonialism and decolonization, "The Wretched of the Earth". "The Wretched of the Earth" was first published in 1961 by Éditions Maspero, with a preface by Jean-Paul Sartre. In it Fanon analyzes the role of class, race, national culture and violence in the struggle for national liberation. The book includes an article which focuses on the ideas of violence and decolonization. He claims that decolonization is inherently a violent process, because the relationship between the settler and the native is a binary of opposites. In fact, he uses the Biblical metaphor, "The last shall be first, and the first, last", to describe the moment of decolonization. The situation of settler colonialism creates within the native a tension which grows over time and in many ways is fostered by the settler. This tension is initially released among the natives, but eventually it becomes a catalyst for violence against the settler. His work would become an academic and theoretical foundation for many revolutions.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon uses the Jewish people to explain how the prejudice expressed towards blacks can not be generalized to other races or ethnicities. He discusses this in "Black Skin, White Masks", and pulls from Jean-Paul Sartre's "Reflections on the Jewish Question" to inform his understanding of French colonialism's relationship with the Jewish people and how it can be compared and contrasted with the oppressions of Blacks across the world. In his seminal book, Fanon issues many rebuttals to Octave Mannoni's "Prospero and Caliban: The Psychology of Colonization". Mannoni asserts that "colonial exploitation is not the same as other forms of exploitation, and colonial racialism is different from other kinds of racialism." Fanon responds by arguing that racism or anti-Semitism, colonial or otherwise, are not different because they rip away a person's ability to feel human. He says: "I am deprived of the possibility of being a man. I cannot disassociate myself from the future that is proposed for my brother. Every one of my acts commits me as a man. Every one of my silences, every one of my cowardices reveals me as a man." In this same vein, Fanon echoes the philosophies of Maryse Choisy, who believed that remaining neutral in times of great injustice implied unforgivable complicity. Specifically, Fanon mentions the ravages of racism and anti-Semitism because he believes that those who are one are necessarily the other as well. Yet he is careful to distinguish between the causes of the two. Fanon argues that the reasons for hating "The Jew" are born from a different fear than those for hating Blacks. Bigots are scared of Jews because they are threatened by what the Jew represents. The many tropes and stereotypes of Jewish cruelty, laziness, and cunning are the antithesis of the Western work ethic. The Black man is feared for perhaps similar traits, but the impetus is different. Essentially, "The Jew" is simply an idea, but Blacks are feared for their physical attributes. Jewishness is not easily detectable to the naked eye, but race is.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Both books established Fanon in the eyes of much of the Third World as the leading anti-colonial thinker of the 20th century.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon's three books were supplemented by numerous psychiatry articles as well as radical critiques of French colonialism in journals such as "Esprit" and El Moudjahid.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: The reception of his work has been affected by English translations which are recognized to contain numerous omissions and errors, while his unpublished work, including his doctoral thesis, has received little attention. As a result, it has been argued Fanon has often been portrayed as an advocate of violence (it would be more accurate to characterize him as a dialectical opponent of nonviolence) and that his ideas have been extremely oversimplified. This reductionist vision of Fanon's work ignores the subtlety of his understanding of the colonial system. For example, the fifth chapter of "Black Skin, White Masks" translates, literally, as "The Lived Experience of the Black" ("L'expérience vécue du Noir"), but Markmann's translation is "The Fact of Blackness", which leaves out the massive influence of phenomenology on Fanon's early work.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In Frantz Fanon’s first book, "Black Skin, White Masks", he tasks himself with exploring the experiences of the black subject. Fanon does not look at the lived experiences in the ordinary sense of the term, but rather considers a domain of experience that is rooted in the context of the world the experience takes place in. The Lived experiences of the black person is the profound sense of feeling and living through the social conditions that define a particular time and place. Fanon navigates the lived experiences of the black subject by drawing inspiration from psychoanalysis, literary texts, medical terminology, philosophy, negritude, and political consciousness. Fanon placed emphasis on the concepts of Political Consciousness and Negritude in the navigation of the experiences of black subjects.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Political Consciousness is the way in which one is crucially a part of the world and its conditions, and how one should attempt to change the world through carefully considered political projects. Political consciousness thus includes a careful consideration of facticity. These include the concrete factors that define your situation in the world, such as the actual physical environment in which you live, the place and time of birth, class membership, nationality, gender, and race, which cannot be transcended. Fanon used the concept of political consciousness to show that the field of psychological phenomena, and the experiences of the black individual, always deserve a political level of analysis.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Negritude is both the celebration of black culture and forms of expression, as well as a resistance to the politics of assimilation. Fanon is aware that the colonised individual accepts art of their white -scripted history and in some ways actively participate in it. However, he rejects the idea that human freedom and the capacity for resistance are extinguished in structurally oppressive social circumstances, such as those in which the colonized and enslaved people lived. Fanon recognises Negritudes positive reinvention of “blackness” as social reality, constructed by the oppressed for specific socio-political, emancipatory, and therapeutic aims.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In "Black Skin, White Masks", Fanon echoes the concepts of Political Consciousness and Negritude by recounting the experiences of the colonised individual. The entirety of the book is a recounting of the lived experiences of a black subject. In the book Fanon places importance on the freedom and agency that the black subject maintains.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: "A Dying Colonialism" is a 1959 book by Fanon that provides an account of how, during the Algerian Revolution, the people of Algeria changed centuries-old cultural patterns and embraced certain ancient cultural practices long derided by their colonialist oppressors as “primitive,” in order to destroy those oppressors. Fanon uses the fifth year of the Algerian Revolution as a point of departure for an explication of the inevitable dynamics of colonial oppression. The militant book describes Fanon's understanding that for the colonized, “having a gun is the only chance you still have of giving a meaning to your death.” It also contains one of his most influential articles, "Unveiled Algeria", that signifies the fall of imperialism and describes how oppressed people struggle to decolonize their "mind" to avoid assimilation.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In "The Wretched of the Earth" (1961, "Les damnés de la terre"), published shortly before Fanon's death, Fanon defends the right of a colonized people to use violence to gain independence. In addition, he delineated the processes and forces leading to national independence or neocolonialism during the decolonization movement that engulfed much of the world after World War II. In defence of the use of violence by colonized peoples, Fanon argued that human beings who are not considered as such (by the colonizer) shall not be bound by principles that apply to humanity in their attitude towards the colonizer. His book was censored by the French government.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: For Fanon in "The Wretched of the Earth", the colonizer's presence in Algeria is based on sheer military strength. Any resistance to this strength must also be of a violent nature because it is the only "language" the colonizer speaks. Thus, violent resistance is a necessity imposed by the colonists upon the colonized. The relevance of language and the reformation of discourse pervades much of his work, which is why it is so interdisciplinary, spanning psychiatric concerns to encompass politics, sociology, anthropology, linguistics and literature.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: His participation in the Algerian Front de Libération Nationale from 1955 determined his audience as the Algerian colonized. It was to them that his final work, "Les damnés de la terre" (translated into English by Constance Farrington as "The Wretched of the Earth") was directed. It constitutes a warning to the oppressed of the dangers they face in the whirlwind of decolonization and the transition to a neo-colonialist, globalized world.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: An often overlooked aspect of Fanon's work is that he did not like to physically write his pieces. Instead, he would dictate to his wife, Josie, who did all of the writing and, in some cases, contributed and edited.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In the first chapter of Fanon's book, "The Wretched of the Earth" he writes about violence and how this is a tool to fight against colonisation. Fanon expresses in this chapter that freedom can not be achieved if violence is not a part of the process. Fanon made this claim by arguing that the nature of colonisation was violent, in the way that black individuals were stripped of their land and treated as lesser people, so the retaliation for achieving freedom needed to be violent. Fanon argued that for colonisers to expect the colonised to achieve freedom through peaceful means was a double standard. Fanon continued to argue that there were two types of violence in a colonial setting. One, he claimed, was the violence that the colonisers had used and the counter-violence which was used by the colonised. Drawing reference to the Apartheid era in South Africa, this bookmark in history will be used as an example to express the thinking of Fanon.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Apartheid was legislation put in place by the white minority in South Africa to oppress the black majority of South Africa. The legislation was used to implement racial segregation between whites and non-whites. This practice was done through the group areas act of 1950, which eventually, along with two other acts, was known as the land acts. The land acts led to people of colour being removed from specific areas that were now considered white occupations. The acts were used to set aside 80% of the land in South Africa for the white minority. The fight against apartheid is often resembled by one major party, the ANC. During this period, many protests were organised in order to fight against the apartheid laws; however, many of these protests were met with violent retaliation from the South African police. One of the most remembered protests was the Sharpeville massacre. The Sharpeville massacre was an organised protest in retaliation to the pass law, which stated that individuals of colour were required to carry a pass in South Africa. The protest led to a total of 249 victims who were attacked by the police. Sixty-nine people of colour were killed, while 180 were injured during this protest. With protests making no progress in combating apartheid, the ANC had concluded that another method would be violence and terrorist acts, which led to the ANC forming their militant group.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: In 1961 the Umkhonto we Sizwe military group was formed. The head of the group was Nelson Mandela. The first acts of violence were intended to be non-lethal, as bombings occurred in buildings related to the apartheid legislation but were empty at the time of the bombings. Later the MK group continued to commit more acts of violence to combat apartheid. The estimate states that the incident rate of violent attacks ranged from 23 incidents in 1977 to an estimated 136 incidents in 1985. During the latter half of the 1980s, the group continued to commit acts of violence in which South African citizens were killed. Fatal attacks include the church street boming of 1983, the Amanzimtoti bombing of 1985, the Magoo's Bar bombing of 1986 and the Johannesburg Magistrate Court boming of 1987. These acts of violence contrast significantly with the earlier point, which states that the ANC were reluctant to use violence in the fight against apartheid. The acts of violence also led to the ANC being branded a terrorist group by the Government.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Apartheid is mentioned in this piece on Fanon because it incorporates Fanon's philosophy on violence, showing that to break colonisation, it must be met with violence due to the nature of the oppression. Apartheid is a clear example of this as the ANC, whose initial methods were to steer away from violence; however, this had not shown any results. Instead, their non-violent protests were met with mass shootings by the South African police force. The mass shootings and killing of people of colour led to the ANC and their turn to violence to fight against apartheid and break the cycle of oppression and colonisation.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon was influenced by a variety of thinkers and intellectual traditions including Jean-Paul Sartre, Lacan, Négritude, and Marxism.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Aimé Césaire was a particularly significant influence in Fanon's life. Césaire, a leader of the "Négritude" movement, was teacher and mentor to Fanon on the island of Martinique. Fanon was first introduced to "Négritude" during his lycée days in Martinique when Césaire coined the term and presented his ideas in "Tropiques", the journal that he edited with Suzanne Césaire, his wife, in addition to his now classic "Cahier d'un retour au pays natal " (Journal of a Homecoming). Fanon referred to Césaire's writings in his own work. He quoted, for example, his teacher at length in "The Lived Experience of the Black Man", a heavily anthologized essay from "Black Skins, White Masks".


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon has had an influence on anti-colonial and national liberation movements. In particular, "Les damnés de la terre" was a major influence on the work of revolutionary leaders such as Ali Shariati in Iran, Steve Biko in South Africa, Malcolm X in the United States and Ernesto Che Guevara in Cuba. Of these only Guevara was primarily concerned with Fanon's theories on violence; for Shariati, Biko and also Guevara the main interest in Fanon was "the new man" and "black consciousness" respectively.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: With regard to the American liberation struggle more commonly known as The Black Power Movement, Fanon's work was especially influential. His book "Wretched of the Earth" is quoted directly in the preface of Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture) and Charles Hamilton's book, "" which was published in 1967, shortly after Carmichael left the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). In addition, Carmichael and Hamilton include much of Fanon's theory on Colonialism in their work, beginning by framing the situation of former slaves in America as a colony situated inside a nation. "To put it another way, there is no "American dilemma" because black people in this country form a colony, and it is not in the interest of the colonial power to liberate them" (Ture Hamilton, 5). Another example is the indictment of the black middle class or what Fanon called the "colonized intellectual" as the indoctrinated followers of the colonial power. Fanon states, "The native intellectual has clothed his aggressiveness in his barely veiled desire to assimilate himself to the colonial world" (47). A third example is the idea that the natives (African Americans) should be constructing new social systems rather than participating in the systems created by the settler population. Ture and Hamilton contend that "black people should create rather than imitate" (144).


title: Frantz Fanon

text: The Black Power group that Fanon had the most influence on was the Black Panther Party (BPP). In 1970 Bobby Seale, the Chairman of the BPP, published a collection of recorded observations made while he was incarcerated entitled "". This book, while not an academic text, is a primary source chronicling the history of the BPP through the eyes of one of its founders. While describing one of his first meetings with Huey P. Newton, Seale describes bringing him a copy of "Wretched of the Earth". There are at least three other direct references to the book, all of them mentioning ways in which the book was influential and how it was included in the curriculum required of all new BPP members. Beyond just reading the text, Seale and the BPP included much of the work in their party platform. The Panther 10 Point Plan contained 6 points which either directly or indirectly referenced ideas in Fanon's work including their contention that there must be an end to the "robbery by the white man", and "education that teaches us our true history and our role in present day society" (67). One of the most important elements adopted by the BPP was the need to build the "humanity" of the native. Fanon claimed that the realization by the native that s/he was human would mark the beginning of the push for freedom (33). The BPP embraced this idea through the work of their Community Schools and Free Breakfast Programs.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Bolivian indianist Fausto Reinaga also had some Fanon influence and he mentions "The Wretched of the Earth" in his magnum opus "La Revolución India", advocating for decolonisation of native South Americans from European influence. In 2015 Raúl Zibechi argued that Fanon had become a key figure for the Latin American left. In August 2021 Fanon's book "Voices of liberation" was one of those brought by Elisa Loncón to the new "plurinational library" of the Constitutional Convention of Chile.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon's influence extended to the liberation movements of the Palestinians, the Tamils, African Americans and others. His work was a key influence on the Black Panther Party, particularly his ideas concerning nationalism, violence and the lumpenproletariat. More recently, radical South African poor people's movements, such as Abahlali baseMjondolo (meaning 'people who live in shacks' in Zulu), have been influenced by Fanon's work. His work was a key influence on Brazilian educationist Paulo Freire, as well.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon has also profoundly affected contemporary African literature. His work serves as an important theoretical gloss for writers including Ghana's Ayi Kwei Armah, Senegal's Ken Bugul and Ousmane Sembène, Zimbabwe's Tsitsi Dangarembga, and Kenya's Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o. Ngũgĩ goes so far to argue in "Decolonizing the Mind" (1992) that it is "impossible to understand what informs African writing" without reading Fanon's "Wretched of the Earth".


title: Frantz Fanon

text: The Caribbean Philosophical Association offers the Frantz Fanon Prize for work that furthers the decolonization and liberation of mankind.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon's writings on black sexuality in "Black Skin, White Masks" have garnered critical attention by a number of academics and queer theory scholars. Interrogating Fanon's perspective on the nature of black homosexuality and masculinity, queer theory academics have offered a variety of critical responses to Fanon's words, balancing his position within postcolonial studies with his influence on the formation of contemporary black queer theory.


title: Frantz Fanon

text: Fanon's legacy has expanded even further into Black Studies and more specifically, into the theories of Afro-pessimism and Black Critical Theory. Thinkers such as Sylvia Wynter, David Marriott, Frank B. Wilderson III, Jared Sexton, Calvin Warren, and Zakkiyah Iman Jackson have taken up Fanon's ontological, phenomenological, and psychoanalytic analyses of the Negro and the "zone of non-being" in order to develop theories of anti-Blackness. Putting Fanon in conversation with prominent thinkers such as Sylvia Wynter, Saidiya Hartman, and Hortense Spillers, and focusing primarily on the Charles Lam Markmann translation of "Black Skin, White Masks", Black Critical Theorists and Afropessimists take seriously the ontological implications of the "Fact of Blackness" and "The Negro and Psychopathology", formulating the Black or the Slave as the non-relational, phobic object that constitutes civil society.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin is an American rock band from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, formed in 1999 by lead singer and guitarist Benjamin Burnley and drummer Jeremy Hummel. The first lineup of the band also included guitarist Aaron Fink and bassist Mark Klepaski. This lineup released two albums, "Saturate" (2002) and "We Are Not Alone" (2004), before Hummel was replaced by Chad Szeliga in 2005. The band released two more studio albums, "Phobia" (2006) and "Dear Agony" (2009), before entering an extended hiatus in early 2010 due to Burnley's recurring illnesses.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Amid the hiatus, the release of a compilation album, "" (2011), unauthorized by Burnley, brought about legal trouble within the band resulting in the dismissal of Fink and Klepaski. Szeliga later announced his departure in 2013 citing creative differences. Burnley remained the sole member of the band until late 2014, when the current lineup was announced, including bassist and backing vocalist Aaron Bruch, guitarist and backing vocalist Keith Wallen, guitarist Jasen Rauch, and drummer Shaun Foist. The band afterward released "Dark Before Dawn" (2015) and "Ember" (2018), which debuted at number one and three on the "Billboard" 200, respectively. Following these albums, the band released another compilation, "Aurora" (2020), featuring reworked acoustic versions of past songs along with one original new song.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Despite significant lineup changes, the band's musical style and lyrical content have remained consistent, with Burnley serving as the primary composer and lead vocalist since the band's inception. The band has commonly been noted for its formulaic hard rock tendencies with angst-heavy lyrics, swelling choruses, and "crunching" guitars. In the United States alone, the band has sold more than 19 million units and yielded three RIAA-certified platinum records, two gold records, and several certified singles, including three multi-platinum, three platinum, and six gold. The band has also produced one number one record on the "Billboard" 200.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Benjamin Burnley was originally in a band named Breaking Benjamin in 1998, that played "softer music", such as Weezer and The Beatles covers, and was "nothing like" subsequent lineups. The name originates from an incident in which Burnley broke a borrowed microphone, prompting its owner to retort, "Thanks to Benjamin for breaking my fucking mic." This band included guitarist Aaron Fink, bassist Nick Hoover, and drummer Chris Lightcap, but soon broke up when Burnley moved to California. After returning to Pennsylvania with drummer Jeremy Hummel, Burnley formed Plan 9, which also included bassist Jason Davoli. Plan 9, a reference to "Plan 9 from Outer Space", was continually misnamed as "Planet 9". Therefore, the group reclaimed the name Breaking Benjamin from the previous band, as Burnley still had promotional stickers with that name.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: The three-piece first gained attention when Freddie Fabbri, a DJ for active rock radio station WBSX, put the group's track "Polyamorous" in rotation. After it became the number one requested track on the station, Fabbri financed the recording of the group's eponymous EP, which sold all 2,000 copies that were printed in 2001. Jonathan "Bug" Price was credited on bass, replacing Davoli. After growing dissatisfied with their previous band, former bandmate Aaron Fink and bassist Mark Klepaski joined Breaking Benjamin. In early 2002, over a dozen record companies visited a two-night showcase where Breaking Benjamin was playing, and the group subsequently signed with Hollywood Records. Shortly afterward, Breaking Benjamin began recording their first full-length major-label record, "Saturate", which was released on August 7, 2002, and produced by Ulrich Wild. It peaked at No. 136 on the "Billboard" 200, and was later certified gold on September 25, 2015. In early 2003, Breaking Benjamin participated in the Jägermeister Music Tour, then toured as a supporting act for Godsmack.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Out of the little media coverage received, "Saturate" garnered positive reception, with Jason Taylor from AllMusic stating that the album "has serious potential to become one of 2002's most successful debuts," feeling that "although it is repetitive and generic, it is undeniably addictive", ultimately scoring the album 2.5 out of 5. The disc received a favorable review from Schwegweb's Vin Cherubino, who noted, "The music has just as much quality as any popular artist in the same genre. Influences from bands such as Tool can be heard, making the music seem all so familiar and palatable."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin returned to the studio in October 2003 with producer David Bendeth for their second album "We Are Not Alone". Burnley also worked with The Smashing Pumpkins front man Billy Corgan over the course of six days in December 2003 to write the songs "Rain", "Forget It", and "Follow". Despite initially being nervous, Burnley felt it was one of the highlights of his career.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: The album was released on June 29, 2004, and sold 48,000 copies in its first week, peaking at No. 20 on the "Billboard" 200. It was later certified gold on October 21, 2004, then platinum on June 13, 2005. It was also certified gold in New Zealand on August 29, 2005. The record features singles such as "So Cold" and "Sooner or Later", both of which peaked at No. 2 on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart. "So Cold" became a platinum single on September 25, 2015. MTV writer Jon Wiederhorn writes that the initial commercial success of the album can be attributed to a tour two weeks prior to the album's debut which "generated prerelease buzz". They later co-headlined a tour with Evanescence, Seether, and Three Days Grace.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: "We Are Not Alone" garnered mixed reviews. It was met with high acclaim from "IGN"s Colin Moriarty, who felt "extremely satisfied," saying "safely and confidently" that it "might be my personal favorite album of the year," giving it a score of 9.3 out of 10. Conversely, "Exclaim!" writer Amber Authier felt that, "On first listen its simply generic sound did nothing for me," though later admitted, "I listened to Breaking Benjamin several times over a week and several elements of the disc started to grow on me, even appeal to me." The writer concluded, "Breaking Benjamin created a standard of quality for themselves that they simply couldn't meet on the entire disc."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: On November 3, 2004, a non-album single named "Blow Me Away" was released, to commercial success, ultimately going gold on November 24, 2015. On November 23, 2004, Breaking Benjamin released the "So Cold" EP, which features live versions of the songs "Away" and "Breakdown", a live acoustic version of "So Cold", and studio acoustic recordings of "Blow Me Away" and "Lady Bug".


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: In late 2005, drummer Hummel filed a federal lawsuit against Breaking Benjamin. According to the lawsuit, Hummel requested earlier that year to take a paternity leave to be with his wife during the birth of their first child, to which all members of the band agreed and hired Kevin Soffera as a temporary substitute on drums. However, Burnley later called Hummel and terminated him, citing chemistry issues. In the lawsuit, Hummel contended wrongful termination and lack of compensation for profits accrued by "We Are Not Alone" and other non-album tracks that appeared in "Halo 2" and "". The band's manager, Larry Mazer (who was also named in the lawsuit), asserted that the lawsuit was "totally frivolous" and his termination had "nothing to do with the paternity leave." Mazer said the band received no payment for the "Halo 2" appearance, adding that the song was included for promotional reasons and Burnley was happy to have it in the video game. The band received minimal payment for the "National Treasure 2" appearance, and Mazer stated that otherwise, "[Hummel] is 100 per cent current." Ben "B.C." Vaught served as a sit-in drummer for the band, and they later toured with 3 Doors Down and Staind in November 2005. The lawsuit was settled for an undisclosed amount in April 2006.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: After the departure of Jeremy Hummel, Breaking Benjamin auditioned fifteen drummers, of whom Chad Szeliga stood out for his ability as a stage performer and the fact that he had "serious problem-solving skills", according to Burnley. The group's next album, "Phobia", was again produced by Bendeth and was the first to be recorded with Szeliga. The concept of the album is dedicated to Burnley's various phobias. The cover of the album depicts a winged man suspended over a runway, which represents the singer's fear of flying. Burnley also suffers from death anxiety, a fear of the dark, driving anxiety, and hypochondria. Burnley cites his fear of flying as for why he did not perform overseas, saying, "I'll go as far as a boat will take me", though at the time the band's record label had not facilitated travel by boat. "Phobia"'s "Intro" and "Outro" tracks feature sound effects of an airport intercom, airplane turbulence, car doors, and crowd panic.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: "Phobia" was released on August 8, 2006, to commercial success. The album sold more than 131,000 copies in its first week of sales and peaked at No. 2 on the "Billboard" 200. It went gold on November 8, 2006, then platinum on May 21, 2009. Its lead single, "The Diary of Jane", peaked at No. 2 on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart and was the fastest single added to radio playlists in the history of Hollywood Records, later receiving a double platinum certification on November 24, 2015. "Breath", the record's second single, spent seven weeks at No. 1 on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart, and went platinum on November 24, 2015. The third single, "Until the End", peaked at No. 6 on the same chart, and became a gold single on February 11, 2014.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: In February 2007 in support of "Phobia", AXS TV (then known as HDNet) aired a one-hour Breaking Benjamin concert from Stabler Arena in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The broadcast recording was included on the re-released "Phobia" DVD in April, billed as "The Homecoming". A music video was created for "Breath" which was made from footage of the song's performance at the show. Breaking Benjamin followed with Spring and Fall tours alongside Three Days Grace, accompanied by Puddle of Mudd during the Spring tour, and Seether, Skillet, and Red during the Fall tour.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: "Phobia" received mixed critical reception. It received praise for general composition and musicianship but received criticism for a lack of originality. AllMusic's Corey Apar found the album "nothing if not consistent," and while generally regarding the disc with positive sentiments, noted a lack of distinction from the "rest of the post-grunge/alt-metal pack" aside from "a certain charm". IGN's Spence D. gave the disc a negative review, citing tedium and lack of vocal distinction, feeling that the group's "intersection of hard rock and emo-oriented introspection" is "not a bad thing, but also not a terribly memorable or earth-shattering one, either." However, the writer praised the musicianship of Fink, Klepaski, and Szeliga, ultimately giving the album a score of 5.7 out of 10. Entertainment Weekly graded the album C+ and noted its angst-ridden themes, saying, "as pathological angst goes, it's expertly done, with expansive choruses and epic riffs – not that that matters, when, like, we're all going to die cold and alone anyway."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin began working on a fourth album, titled "Dear Agony", in 2009. It was the first album Burnley wrote while completely sober. In 2007, Burnley experienced fatigue and phosphenes following three consecutive days of no sleep and heavy drinking, after which he decided to remain sober. Burnley acknowledged an improved clarity and coherence within "Dear Agony" due to his sobriety. The album cover features Burnley's brain scan, representing the recurrent themes on "Dear Agony" related to the singer's chronic illnesses caused by alcohol consumption.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Burnley collaborated with then-Red guitarist Jasen Rauch on various tracks for "Dear Agony": The two equally wrote together the songs "Without You" and "Hopeless", and Rauch wrote the outro for "I Will Not Bow", also helping write "Lights Out". Burnley said of the collaboration, "I love writing with him because he does stuff exactly like I would've done," adding, "writing-wise, we're like the same person."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: "Dear Agony" was released on September 9, 2009, and peaked at No. 4 on the "Billboard" 200. The disc initially outsold its predecessor in its first week, moving more than 134,000 copies. It ultimately achieved gold certification on February 16, 2010. The album's lead single "I Will Not Bow" reached No. 1 on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart, and went platinum on November 24, 2015. The other two singles, "Lights Out" and "Give Me a Sign", peaked at No. 9 and No. 6 on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart, respectively (the latter of which also receiving a gold certification on November 24, 2015).


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin toured in support of the album in January and February 2010 with Three Days Grace and Flyleaf, then with Red, Chevelle, and Thousand Foot Krutch in March 2010. In April, Breaking Benjamin began touring with Nickelback, Shinedown, and Sick Puppies on their Dark Horse Tour. Prior to the last show of the Dark Horse Tour, Burnley stated he was ill and therefore no longer able to tour in support of the album, placing the band on hiatus. After internet rumors began to circulate that the band had broken up, Burnley released a statement "officially letting everyone know that Breaking Benjamin has not broken up."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: "Dear Agony" received mixed critical reception. AllMusic's James Monger gave the album a positive review, stating it "feels a lot like their first three", noting a consistency that "feels like a well-oiled machine." The disc received a negative review from Consequence of Sound's Alex Young, who complained of over-production and the disc's sell-out nature at the hands of three-time Breaking Benjamin producer David Bendeth: "Dear Agony is the unfortunate side effect of a trend in 'producer' David Bendeth's world, training wild chimpanzees to be more tasteful whilst handling silverware", ultimately giving the record a half-star "for teaching Breaking Benjamin's peers who not to hire for production credit." About Entertainment gave the record a mixed review, feeling that "Though it lacks the breakthrough singles of "Phobia", "Dear Agony" does have its moments," adding, "frustratingly, "Dear Agony" never reaches greatness, settling for an admirable competency that's still the envy of many of their contemporaries."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: In March 2010, Hollywood Records requested that the band produce two new master recordings and a greatest hits album, and sought permission to release a new version of the hit song "Blow Me Away" featuring Sydnee Duran of Valora. In May 2011, Fink and Klepaski granted the record company's requests after they were offered a $100,000 payment. Burnley, alleging that Fink and Klepaski acted unilaterally on both the song remix and the compilation album, not informing him or the band's management, fired the two via email, demanding at least $250,000 in punitive fees and compensatory damages, as well as the exclusive right to the name Breaking Benjamin. Fink and Klepaski's attorneys stated the two "dispute and strictly deny" Burnley's allegations, instead asserting that a January 2009 agreement (allowing Burnley to dismiss them for "just cause") was no longer valid because of the singer's status of indefinite hiatus. The case was ordered by a judge to arbitration. Burnley's attorney, Brian Caplan, told the Associated Press, "The relationship between Mr. Burnley and the two other members of the band has ended ... Mr. Burnley intends on moving forward using the name Breaking Benjamin and the band will continue. It just won't continue in its prior configuration. He's not retiring."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: In August 2011, Hollywood Records scheduled the release of the "" compilation album, featuring every single from the band's catalog, including the remix of "Blow Me Away". A two-disc deluxe edition was released alongside it, with the second disc containing altered versions of b-sides and rarities. Burnley publicly opposed the album's release, saying content had been altered without his consent and did not meet his standards. Burnley later elaborated, saying that the rarities were taken off of his laptop without his consent, and were intended for in-studio reference and not public release, but that he was otherwise content with previously released tracks on "Shallow Bay". The album was released on August 16, 2011, and peaked at No. 22 on the "Billboard" 200, also topping the Hard Rock Albums chart in 2011, 2012, and 2013. The disc received positive critical reception. "The Daily Trojan"'s Krishna Jetti praised it for balance and a progressive retrospective history. AllMusic's Gregory Heaney felt similarly, saying, ""Shallow Bay" is a great jumping-on point for new fans, capturing the band at their height delivering some of their best moments in one convenient package. For older fans, this collection may just serve as a reminder of a crucial turning point in Breaking Benjamin's career."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: In April 2013, Burnley announced that the dispute involving Fink and Klepaski was resolved, and that he would retain the right to continue the band under the name Breaking Benjamin. Three days later, Szeliga announced his departure, citing creative differences.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: In August 2014, Breaking Benjamin announced via Facebook that the band reformed as a quintet with, except for Burnley, all new members, including: "Dear Agony" co-writer Jasen Rauch (guitar, originally from Red); Keith Wallen (guitar and backing vocals, originally from Adelitas Way); Aaron Bruch (bass and backing vocals); and Shaun Foist (drums, originally from Picture Me Broken). Burnley said of the lineup: "Everybody that's in the band now is deliberately handpicked," noting that "Keith [Wallen] and Aaron [Bruch] are really, really amazing singers. That's kind of what the band always needed." On March 18, 2015, a new single entitled "Failure" as well as a new album, "Dark Before Dawn", were announced for release on March 23 and June 23, respectively.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: The new lineup debuted with acoustic shows in late 2014, then went on a four-venue winter tour in the north-eastern United States. The band afterward announced 2015 spring, summer, and fall tour dates, supported by bands such as Young Guns and Starset. In July 2015, the band announced their first overseas performance, in which they headlined a four-day cruise venue in February 2016 along with Yngwie Malmsteen, Zakk Wylde, Flyleaf, et al. The band also performed on a joint U.S. tour with Shinedown in October and November along with Sevendust, and proceeded to play further outside of the United States in June 2016 at venues such as the Download Festival in the United Kingdom, Rock am Ring in Germany, and Nova Rock in Austria.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Burnley explained that writing for "Dark Before Dawn" was intermittent and fragmentary, taking place throughout the hiatus, though it was toward the end of the hiatus in 2013 when it became cohesive. After growing frustrated with the lack of answers regarding his health condition, Burnley decided to abandon searching for a diagnosis and focus on the album. Recorded and produced at a personal studio of Burnley's, "Dark Before Dawn" is the first album with the front man credited as the producer. Burnley stated that, "I would say that I did the same amount of producing on this album as I've done on other albums, just never had my name [on it]", adding, "You know, I'm not doing anything different here than I have done in the past. Why shouldn't I be known to be doing it?"


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Within an hour of pre-order availability, "Dark Before Dawn" reached No. 1 on the rock albums chart on iTunes and No. 3 on the overall album chart. It sold 135,000 pure album units and 141,000 equivalent album units in its first week, debuting at No. 1 on the "Billboard" 200, making the album the group's heretofore most successful sales effort. It achieved gold certification on August 18, 2016. The disc's lead single "Failure" spent nine weeks at No. 1 on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart as well. "Billboard"'s Jason Lipshutz felt the album's success was "eyebrow-raising", noting that, in addition to the band's lineup change, "135,000 in pure album sales is a hefty number in 2015 – it's a bigger number than the respective bows of recent Madonna, ASAP Rocky, and Kelly Clarkson albums". Joe DeTomaso, program director of active rock station WAQX-FM, added that, "They've always been a top-level band for the format, but not quite on the level of Disturbed or Shinedown or bands like that. They always seem to put out hit records without getting the kind of recognition that they deserved." "Forbes"' Hugh McIntyre writes that runner-up Tori Kelly's 75,000 copies "puts Breaking Benjamin's figures into perspective", and that despite "a pretty extensive lineup change, it looks like fans were awaiting their return with open arms."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: The album was met with mostly positive critical reception, many critics praising the album for staying true to the group's sound, though others criticized it for sounding too similar to previous material. Dan Marsicano from About Entertainment stated, "Burnley could have made his creation just another dose of the glitzy, overproduced crap that is heard on every rock radio station in the world. Instead, Breaking Benjamin hardly deviate from the hooky jams that were present on "Dear Agony"." Conversely, AllMusic's James Monger felt that "it's hard to conceal the fact that most of these songs are nearly interchangeable with the band's older material." "Revolver"'s Jeremy Borjon felt that "the music's true force only becomes apparent through deeper and repeated listenings, as the songs, on the surface, have a tendency to blend into one another."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: The group's sixth studio album was first revealed to be completed in August 2017. The band toured with Avenged Sevenfold and Bullet For My Valentine on their North American tour, following with a U.S. mini-tour with 10 Years, and then a tour with Five Finger Death Punch beginning in the second quarter of 2018. In December 2017, "Ember" and its lead single "Red Cold River" were announced for release in the second quarter of 2018 and January 5, 2018, respectively. On January 26, "Feed the Wolf" was released as a pre-order bonus, along with a release date for the album of April 13, 2018. Three subsequent songs—"Blood", "Psycho", and "Save Yourself"—were released ahead of the album as promotional releases. It sold 88,000 units in its first week of sales, debuting at No. 3 on the "Billboard" 200. "Red Cold River" peaked at No. 2 on the Mainstream Rock Songs chart, and No. 5 on the Hot Rock Songs chart.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Writing for the album began in 2016, with recording primarily happening in 2017. While Burnley remained the primary composer for the album, he stated that around half of it was written by the rest of the band. Burnley returned to producing for the album, along with the rest of the band, a first for the group. Rauch commented that the album pushes the boundaries with heavier material than the band's done in the past. He said "playing-wise, it's the most difficult album", and that they took advantage of the three-guitar player dynamic, but that the album nonetheless does not depart from Breaking Benjamin's established sound. Burnley explained that there was demand for heavier material from fans, and that the group was happy to reflect that. He later explained that he believed fans gravitated to the heavier side of the band, but that "we also make sure to explore our melodic and softer side too", saying that the album seeks to give both sides to the furthest degree.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Burnley stated that he chose "Ember" as the album title as something that could be the end of something or the start of it, but emphasized an intentional ambiguity to leave it open to interpretation. Official music videos were released for singles "Red Cold River", "Torn in Two", and "Tourniquet" on January 18, April 12, and December 13, respectively, with Burnley explaining that they are part of a three-part continuity. The music video for "Torn in Two" is a continuation of a narrative started by "Red Cold River", and features references to all of Breaking Benjamin's past music videos. "Tourniquet" concludes the trilogy as a sequel to both previous videos. Dancer and actor Derek Hough (who had previously covered "Ashes of Eden" in a choreographed music video) has an appearance on the album, saying that the opportunity was "a dream come true". Burnley later explained that he reached out to Hough after seeing his cover of "Ashes of Eden", and that the song he is featured on is "The Dark of You".


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: "Ember" received mostly positive critical reception, and was noted both for its familiarity and its heavier stylistic shift. AllMusic's Neil Yeung gave a generally favorable review but emphasized its familiarity, saying, "As far as variety goes, this is a fairly standard collection of tunes from a band that is mainly concerned with giving fans what they want and expect." Conversely, Loudwire's Chad Childers called "Ember" "a heavy record—not just in terms of sound where you could argue that they've never sounded heavier, but also in terms of lyrical content", saying the group is "proving that they're better (and yes, heavier) than ever with plenty still left to say." Luke Nuttall of "The Soundboard" gave the album a mixed review, saying, "Even the most dedicated diehard has to admit that this is far from groundbreaking or any sort of departure from their past material, and such an unashamed recycling of work seldom leads to positive results", but adding that, ""Ember" manages to elevate above radio-rock's most uninspired efforts, but this is purely for those who've been there all the way through; for everyone else, it's there to embrace or avoid as per want."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: In an interview in December 2018, Burnley stated there will be an album of acoustic renditions of past songs in 2019. In July 2019, Burnley confirmed during a radio interview that the new acoustic album will feature collaborations from Red, Underoath, Saint Asonia, and Lacey Sturm.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: The band's 2019 North American headline tour with Chevelle and Three Days Grace went from July 21 to September 25.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: On October 28, 2019, the band officially announced the album "Aurora" via their official social media pages, with a release date of January 24, 2020. They also announced their 2020 co-headlining North American tour with Korn. On December 6, 2019, the band released "Far Away" featuring Scooter Ward of Cold, the first single from "Aurora". On January 10, 2020, the band released an acoustic version of "Red Cold River" featuring Spencer Chamberlain of Underoath. In March 2020, they announced their summer 2020 tour, with Bush, Theory of a Deadman, Saint Asonia, and Cory Marks. On May 19, 2020, the band announced the cancellation of the tour due to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: On July 10, 2020, the band released a cover of the Goo Goo Dolls' "Iris", with singer Diamante. In August 2022, the band released a collaborative song with Starset called "Waiting on the Sky to Change".


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin's musical style is primarily classified as hard rock and alternative rock, more specifically post-grunge and alternative metal, and has commonly been noted for its consistency. Corey Apar felt that "Breaking Benjamin are nothing if not consistent", and Alex Young felt that "Breaking Benjamin is one of the few modern rock bands on the radio that, if you have heard any song in its catalog prior, could be immediately recognized." Despite a complete lineup change prior to the release of "Dark Before Dawn", Dan Marsicano stated, "Breaking Benjamin hardly deviate from the hooky jams that were present on "Dear Agony". They have had an established sound since their breakout "We Are Not Alone" – hard-edged riffs with emotional upheaval – and that isn't tampered with on "Dark Before Dawn"."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Their style is described by Apar as "mixing heavy hard rock dynamics with a moody demeanor that never slips into full-on dejection." Spence D. characterizes the band as "[persisting] in delivering crunching guitars topped off with somewhat generic, angst-ridden [lyrics] that waffle between being plaintive and aggressive" with vocals that "[deliver] just the right amount of emotion, fluctuating between contemplative subjectivity and growling anger." Young felt that Breaking Benjamin is "indicative of early '00s modern rock, while also now and then being more Filter-esque or technically proficient, primarily on guitar during 2002's "Saturate", and from then on, with bass and drums."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin's style was described by "The Wall Street Journal" in 2020 as "a subgenre of rock 'n' roll, often called 'active rock'... the genre includes bands like Disturbed, Five Finger Death Punch, and Three Days Grace, hard rockers who growl and yell, but can be as tender and emotive as Coldplay."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Burnley is the primary songwriter in the band. Music industry attorney and author Martin Frascogna writes that "it's unmistakably clear that Burnley started the group, is the creative force behind the group and essentially dictates the group's decisions." Bands such as Nirvana, Live, Bush, Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots, and The Beatles have been cited as influences. Burnley remarked in 2009 that while the other band members did contribute, it was "always left up to me to put all the pieces together and make it so that it's even anything at all." However, Burnley expressed how he considered Rauch to be his "writing partner" during "Dear Agony", and that he looked forward to writing with him in the future. After joining the band in 2014 as part of the new lineup, Rauch provided writing contributions on "Dark Before Dawn", writing the intro and outro tracks as well as riffs on two other tracks. Burnley revealed in 2015 that the whole band would write songs for Breaking Benjamin in the future, and that "It just so happens that when they came on board for this album, I was already 95 percent done", adding, "I'm really looking forward to writing the next one all together." 2018's "Ember" represents the band's first effort with full composition credit given to members other than Burnley.


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin's lyrical content evolved as a product of Burnley's sobriety, the front man noting that the lyricism in "Dear Agony" is more thought out. Rito Asilo of the "Inquirer" writes that Burnley "owes the improved clarity and coherence in Breaking Benjamin's music to sobriety." Burnley has said that before sobriety, anything that made sense thematically was a coincidence, and that he would take shots if he were dissatisfied with a lyric. Breaking Benjamin's lyrics have been noted for their vague, angst-heavy themes, Burnley saying that "I try to keep my writing vague so people can draw their own conclusions."


title: Breaking Benjamin

text: Breaking Benjamin's live sound has corresponded with lineup arrangements. The band originally lacked backing vocalists and tertiary instrumentation, requiring them to rely on pre-recorded tracks during live performances. However, the band was noted for a change in such respects with the second iteration of the band assembled in 2014. Bruch and Wallen were selected in part for their ability as singers, providing all backing vocals on both new studio recordings and during live shows. Burnley noted that it was important to add two new singers in order to replicate vocal techniques such as three-part harmonies, octave range, and layered vocals. Rauch, acting as a third guitarist, provides the band with "more freedom while simultaneously thickening up their live sound", as some songs feature three guitar parts, layered guitars, or are meant to feature Burnley only performing vocals, such as "I Will Not Bow" and "Lights Out". Foist utilizes Roland V-Kit electronic drums during live performances and triggers certain sounds as heard in studio recordings, such as the piano notes in "Breakdown". Additionally, Rauch is equipped with a Roland GR-55 guitar synthesizer allowing him to play orchestral strings and choir sound effects, further eliminating any reliance on pre-recorded tracks.


title: Maybach

text: Maybach (, ) is a German luxury car brand that exists today as a part of Mercedes-Benz. The original company was founded in 1909 by Wilhelm Maybach and his son Karl Maybach, originally as a subsidiary of "Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH", and it was known as "Luftfahrzeug-Motorenbau GmbH" until 1999.


title: Maybach

text: In 1960, Maybach was acquired by Daimler-Benz. The name returned as a standalone ultra-luxury car brand in 2002, sharing significant components with Mercedes-Benz cars. After slow sales, Maybach ceased to be a standalone brand by 2013, and it became (in 2015) a sub-brand of Mercedes-Benz, which is owned by the Mercedes-Benz Group. , Daimler produces an ultra-luxury edition of the Mercedes-Benz S-Class and Mercedes-Benz GLS-Class under the Mercedes-Maybach name.


title: Maybach

text: Wilhelm Maybach was technical director of the "Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft" (DMG) until he left in 1907. On 23 March 1909, he founded the new company, "Luftfahrzeug-Motorenbau GmbH" (literally "Aircraft Engine Building Company"), with his son Karl Maybach as director. In 1912, they renamed it to "Maybach-Motorenbau GmbH" ("Maybach Engine Construction Company"). The company originally developed and manufactured diesel and petrol engines for Zeppelins, and then rail cars. Its Maybach Mb.IVa was used in aircraft and airships of World War I.


title: Maybach

text: The company first built an experimental car in 1919, introduced as a production model two years later at the Berlin Motor Show. Between 1921 and 1940, the company produced a variety of opulent vehicles, now regarded as classics. The company also continued to build heavy-duty diesel engines for marine and rail purposes.


title: Maybach

text: Maybach had a British subsidiary, Maybach Gears Ltd, that specialised in gearboxes. In 1938, in conjunction with Dr Henry Merritt, they produced a gearbox and steering system – the 'Merritt-Maybach' – for the abortive Nuffield A.16E1 Cruiser tank design.


title: Maybach

text: During the Second World War, Maybach produced the engines for most of Nazi Germany's tanks and half-tracks. These included almost all the production tank engines through Panzer I, II, III, IV and V, the Tiger I and II (Maybach HL230) and other heavy tanks: and also engines for half-tracks such as the Sd.Kfz. 251 personnel carrier and prime movers like the Sd.Kfz. 9. The engine plant was one of several industries targeted at Friedrichshafen.


title: Maybach

text: After WW II, the factory performed some repair work, but automotive production was never restarted, and some 20 years later, the company was renamed MTU Friedrichshafen.


title: Maybach

text: Daimler-Benz purchased the company in 1960. Post-1960, the company was mainly used to make special editions of Mercedes cars in the W108 and W116 model range, which were virtually hand built. These cars however carried the Mercedes badge and serial numbers.


title: Maybach

text: Rolls-Royce Power Systems AG, based in Friedrichshafen, used to manufacture the commercial Maybach diesel engines under the MTU brand through its subsidiary MTU Friedrichshafen GmbH.


title: Maybach

text: Daimler presented a luxury concept car at the 1997 Tokyo Motor Show. A production model based on it was introduced in two sizes – the Maybach 57 and the Maybach 62, reflecting the lengths of the automobiles in decimetres. In 2005 the 57S was added, powered by a 6.0 L V12 bi-turbo engine producing and of torque, and featuring various cosmetic touches.


title: Maybach

text: To promote the new Maybach line, Mercedes-Benz engaged figures such as Maybach heir Ulrich Schmid-Maybach and golfer Nick Faldo to serve as brand ambassadors.


title: Maybach

text: Initially, Daimler-Chrysler predicted annual sales of 2,000 worldwide with 50 per cent coming from the United States; however, these expectations never materialized. In 2007, Mercedes bought back 29 US dealers, reducing the total from 71 to 42. In 2010, only 157 Maybachs were sold worldwide, compared to 2,711 similarly priced Rolls-Royces. By the time of the announcement that the brand was to be laid back to rest, 3,000 had been sold worldwide since the brand was revived in 2002.


title: Maybach

text: Daimler announced in November 2011 that Maybach would cease to be a brand by 2013 and manufactured the last Maybach vehicle in December 2012. This was because of poor sales.


title: Maybach

text: With poor sales and the heavy impact of the financial crisis of 2007–2008, Daimler AG undertook a complete review of the Maybach division, approaching Aston Martin to engineer and style the next generation of Maybach models along with the next generation of Lagondas. According to Automotive News, only 44 Maybachs had been sold in the United States in the first ten months of 2011.


title: Maybach

text: An article in "Fortune" noted that Mercedes had missed out on the chance to purchase Rolls-Royce and Bentley when they were up for sale in the 1990s: "Mercedes backpedaled and decided it needed to be in the ultra-luxury business too, but it went after it in a remarkably clumsy way." It further stated that the first Maybach models had poor driving dynamics compared to its contemporaries from Rolls-Royce and Bentley: "Mercedes took an aging S-class chassis and plopped an absurdly elongated body on it ... rather than develop a new car from the wheels up, as BMW did with Rolls-Royce, or cleverly use the underpinnings of an existing model like the Volkswagen Phaeton for a new Bentley." Furthermore, Maybachs were never advertised as owner-driven vehicles, as the company believed that the luxury amenities would be sufficient to drive sales, and they even insisted that auto journalists (who usually test drive the vehicle) ride in the backseat.


title: Maybach

text: Another suggestion for Maybach's struggles was that parent Daimler had failed to differentiate it from its Mercedes-Benz brand. While all three ultra-luxury marques share platforms and engines with other luxury brands from their parent auto company, Maybachs are built alongside the Mercedes-Benz S-Class flagship sedan, whereas Rolls-Royce and Bentley are assembled in England (separate from the rest of BMW and Volkswagen Group's respective production plants), and thus are regarded as being more "exclusive". Furthermore, the Maybach's pedigree was virtually unknown outside of Germany, unlike its British rivals which have long enjoyed renown worldwide; indeed the 2006 Rolls-Royce Phantom's interior evokes memories of a 1930s car while the Maybach 57S's inside makes no reference to its marque's history.


title: Maybach

text: In November 2011, Daimler's CEO Dieter Zetsche announced that the Maybach-brand would cease to exist in 2012, making room for other models of the Mercedes-Benz S-Class. The Maybach-limousines were still being sold up to the year 2013, but after that, the name "Maybach" would not be used anymore. On 14 August 2012, parent Daimler AG announced the official discontinuation of Maybach by releasing a price sheet officially discontinuing the Maybach 57, 57S, 62, 62S and Landaulet. On 17 December 2012, the last Maybach vehicle was manufactured in Sindelfingen.


title: Maybach

text: The company announced that the line would be replaced by the next-generation of the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, Model W222, due for the 2014 model year, particularly the long wheelbase S-Class Pullman. An executive told a Frankfurt newspaper that "Daimler came to the conclusion that the sales chances for the Mercedes brand were better than that of Maybach."


title: Maybach

text: In November 2014, Daimler announced the revival of the Maybach name as a sub-brand of the Mercedes-Benz S-Class (W222), positioned as an upscale version akin to the more sporty Mercedes-AMG sub-brand. In anticipation of its April 2015 launch, the flagship Mercedes-Maybach S600 was unveiled at car shows in Los Angeles, United States, and Guangzhou, China, and the production model at the 2015 Geneva Motor Show. During the facelift, the S 500 and S 550 were redesignated S 560 and the flagship was renamed S 650.


title: Maybach

text: Assembled on the same Sindelfingen line used for the S-Class, the model is targeted against the Bentley Mulsanne and Rolls-Royce Phantom. At long with a wheelbase of (132.5 inches), it is approximately longer than the long-wheelbase S-Class models. The Mercedes-Maybach will be available as S500 (S550 in the US) and S600 models, with 4matic all-wheel-drive optional with the V8 engine. Acceleration is in 5.0 seconds. The base car has several colour finish options and the choice between a three-seat rear bench, or two seats reclining. Options include: air-conditioned, heated and massaging seats; heated armrests; a system to pump scented, ionised air around the cabin; and a 1540 watt Burmester 3D surround sound system with 24 speakers. Maybach S500 assembly in Pune, India, began in September 2015, making India the second country to produce a Maybach.


title: Maybach

text: The first Mercedes-Maybach concept car is the Vision Mercedes-Maybach 6, a large 2-door coupe with a fully electric drivetrain. The model was unveiled at the 2016 Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance. The latest concept car is Project MAYBACH, a Mercedes-Maybach S-Class.


title: Maybach

text: 2 were the 5.7 L inline six engines built for and ordered by Spyker. Not all were purchased, and Karl had to build cars featuring the engines to offset costs.


title: Maybach

text: The Maybach 57 from in about 5.1 seconds; the Maybach 62 and 57 S, about 4.8 seconds; the Maybach 62 S and the Landaulet in 4.5 seconds. This rapid acceleration is noteworthy for cars weighing well over 6,000 pounds (2.7 metric tons). Maybachs in general are extremely powerful: the 57 has ; the 57 S, ; the 62, ; the 62 S, , and the Landaulet, .


title: Maybach

text: Options for the Maybach 62 and 62S included 18-way power rear seats (replacing 14-way), power side and rear sunshade curtains, cooled rear seats, wireless headphones, electrochromic panoramic sunroof with solar panel for vehicle-off ventilation (replacing two choices of power sunroof) and interior partition with power, electrochromic glass divider.


title: Maybach

text: It was announced by the parent company Daimler in November 2020 planned to double its sales, on the back of strong Chinese demand, where the car is used as a limousine.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: The Republic (; ) is a Socratic dialogue, authored by Plato around 375 BCE, concerning justice (), the order and character of the just city-state, and the just man. It is Plato's best-known work, and one of the world's most influential works of philosophy and political theory, both intellectually and historically.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: In the dialogue, Socrates discusses the meaning of justice and whether the just man is happier than the unjust man with various Athenians and foreigners. They consider the natures of existing regimes and then propose a series of different, hypothetical cities in comparison, culminating in Kallipolis (Καλλίπολις), a utopian city-state ruled by a philosopher-king. They also discuss ageing, love, theory of forms, the immortality of the soul, and the role of the philosopher and of poetry in society. The dialogue's setting seems to be during the Peloponnesian War.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: While visiting the city of Piraeus with Glaucon, Polemarchus tells Socrates to join him for a romp. They eventually end up at Polemarchus' house where Socrates encounters Polemarchus' father Cephalus.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: In his first philosophical conversation with the group members, Socrates gets into a conversation with Cephalus.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: The first real philosophical question posed by Plato in the book is when Socrates ask “is life painful at that age, or what report do you make of it?” when speaking to Cephalus who is older than Socrates.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Plato is seemingly interested with aging and love and in what manner they will have on him. It is obviously a brief but salient point by Plato for it is the first real discussion in the book.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Cephalus answers by saying that many are unhappy about old age because they miss their youth. But he then goes on to say that he has met other men who do not feel this way. Cephalus then mentions a story that when he was in the presence of one of these men named Sophocles and he was ask “how do you feel about love, Sophocles are you still capable of it? To which he replied, Hush! if you please: to my great delight I have escaped from it, and feel as if I have escaped from a frantic and savage master.”


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Cephalus then goes on to say that he feels that Sophocles has spoken wisely. Then Cephalus says that “unquestionably for old age brings us profound repose and freedom from this (love) and other passions. When the appetites have abated, and their force is diminished, the description of Sophocles is perfectly realized. It is like being delivered from a multitude of furious masters.” This seems to set Socrates at ease and the conversations move on to discuss Justice.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Plato seems to be asking the question about both “love” (strong attachment and affection) and Sexual intercourse or libido (sexual desire) in this story. Plato is indicating that as we age or enter the “threshold of age” (age above 65) that we can escape/release/detach from our passions and desires (those frantic and savage masters) and can now live contently and in repose. It also seems to indicate that if realizing this nonattachment and escape from love and other carnal earthly passions earlier on in life as Socrates has come to learn. It could bring freedom, contentedness and repose to ones life much sooner. One of Plato's most famous quotes is "The greatest wealth is to live content with little."


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Socrates then asks Cephalus, Polemarchus, and Thrasymachus for their definitions of justice. Cephalus defines justice as giving what is owed. Polemarchus says justice is "the art which gives good to friends and evil to enemies." Thrasymachus proclaims "justice is nothing else than the interest of the stronger." Socrates overturns their definitions and says that it is to one's advantage to be just and disadvantage to be unjust. The first book ends in aporia concerning its essence.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: In the first book, two definitions of justice are proposed but deemed inadequate. Returning debts owed, and helping friends while harming enemies, are commonsense definitions of justice that, Socrates shows, are inadequate in exceptional situations, and thus lack the rigidity demanded of a definition. Yet he does not completely reject them, for each expresses a commonsense notion of justice that Socrates will incorporate into his discussion of the just regime in books II through V.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: At the end of Book I, Socrates agrees with Polemarchus that justice includes helping friends, but says the just man would never do harm to anybody. Thrasymachus believes that Socrates has done the men present an injustice by saying this and attacks his character and reputation in front of the group, partly because he suspects that Socrates himself does not even believe harming enemies is unjust. Thrasymachus gives his understanding of justice and injustice as "justice is what is advantageous to the stronger, while injustice is to one's own profit and advantage". Socrates finds this definition unclear and begins to question Thrasymachus. Socrates then asks whether the ruler who makes a mistake by making a law that lessens their well-being, is still a ruler according to that definition. Thrasymachus agrees that no true ruler would make such an error. This agreement allows Socrates to undermine Thrasymachus' strict definition of justice by comparing rulers to people of various professions. Thrasymachus consents to Socrates' assertion that an artist is someone who does his job well, and is a knower of some art, which allows him to complete the job well. In so doing Socrates gets Thrasymachus to admit that rulers who enact a law that does not benefit them firstly, are in the precise sense "not" rulers. Thrasymachus gives up, and is silent from then on. Socrates has trapped Thrasymachus into admitting the strong man who makes a mistake is not the strong man in the precise sense, and that some type of knowledge is required to rule perfectly. However, it is far from a satisfactory definition of justice.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Socrates believes he has answered Thrasymachus and is done with the discussion of justice. Socrates' young companions, Glaucon and Adeimantus, continue the argument of Thrasymachus for the sake of furthering the discussion. Glaucon gives a lecture in which he argues first that the origin of justice was in social contracts aimed at preventing one from suffering injustice and being unable to take revenge, second that all those who practice justice do so unwillingly and out of fear of punishment, and third that the life of the unjust man is far more blessed than that of the just man. Glaucon would like Socrates to prove that justice is not only desirable, but that it belongs to the highest class of desirable things: those desired both for their own sake and their consequences. To demonstrate the problem, he tells the story of Gyges, who – with the help of a ring that turns him invisible – achieves great advantages for himself by committing injustices.The only reason that men are just and praise justice is out of fear of being punished for injustice. The law is a product of compromise between individuals who agree not to do injustice to others if others will not do injustice to them. Glaucon says that if people had the power to do injustice without fear of punishment, they would not enter into such an agreement. Glaucon uses this argument to challenge Socrates to defend the position that the just life is better than the unjust life. Adeimantus adds to Glaucon's speech the charge that men are only just for the results that justice brings one fortune, honor, reputation. Adeimantus challenges Socrates to prove that being just is worth something in and of itself, not only as a means to an end.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: After Glaucon's speech, Adeimantus adds that, in this thought experiment, the unjust should not fear any sort of divine judgement in the afterlife, since the very poets who wrote about such judgement also wrote that the gods would grant forgiveness to those humans who made ample religious sacrifice. Adeimantus demonstrates his reason by drawing two detailed portraits, that the unjust man could grow wealthy by injustice, devoting a percentage of this gain to religious losses, thus rendering him innocent in the eyes of the gods.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Socrates suggests that they use the city as an image to seek how justice comes to be in the soul of an individual. After attributing the origin of society to the individual not being self-sufficient and having many needs which he cannot supply himself, they go on to describe the development of the city. Socrates first describes the "healthy state", but Glaucon considers this hardly different than "a city of pigs." Socrates then goes on to describe the luxurious city, which he calls "a fevered state". This requires a guardian class to defend and attack on its account.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: This begins a discussion concerning the type of education that ought to be given to these guardians in their early years, including the topic of what kind of stories are appropriate. They conclude that stories that ascribe evil to the gods are untrue and should not be taught. They suggest that guardians should be educated in these four cardinal virtues: wisdom, courage, justice and temperance. They also suggest that the second part of the guardians' education should be in gymnastics. With physical training they will be able to live without needing frequent medical attention: physical training will help prevent illness and weakness. Socrates asserts that both male and female guardians be given the same education, that all wives and children be shared, and that they be prohibited from owning private property.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: In the fictional tale known as the myth or parable of the metals, Socrates presents the Noble Lie (γενναῖον ψεῦδος, gennaion pseudos), to explain the origin of the three social classes. Socrates proposes and claims that if the people believed "this myth...[it] would have a good effect, making them more inclined to care for the state and one another."Socrates assumes each person will be happy engaging in the occupation that suits them best. If the city as a whole is happy, then individuals are happy. In the physical education and diet of the guardians, the emphasis is on moderation, since both poverty and excessive wealth will corrupt them (422a1). Without controlling their education, the city cannot control the future rulers. Socrates says that it is pointless to worry over specific laws, like those pertaining to contracts, since proper education ensures lawful behavior, and poor education causes lawlessness (425a–425c).


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Socrates proceeds to search for wisdom, courage, and temperance in the city, on the grounds that justice will be easier to discern in what remains (427e). They find wisdom among the guardian rulers, courage among the guardian warriors (or auxiliaries), temperance among all classes of the city in agreeing about who should rule and who should be ruled. Finally, Socrates defines justice in the city as the state in which each class performs only its own work, not meddling in the work of the other classes (433b).


title: Republic (Plato)

text: The virtues discovered in the city are then sought in the individual soul. For this purpose, Socrates creates an analogy between the parts of the city and the soul (the city–soul analogy). He argues that psychological conflict points to a divided soul, since a completely unified soul could not behave in opposite ways towards the same object, at the same time, and in the same respect (436b). He gives examples of possible conflicts between the rational, spirited, and appetitive parts of the soul, corresponding to the rulers, auxiliaries, and producing classes in the city. Having established the tripartite soul, Socrates defines the virtues of the individual. A person is wise if he is ruled by the part of the soul that knows “what is beneficial for each part and for the whole,” courageous if his spirited part “preserves in the midst of pleasures and pains” the decisions reached by the rational part, and temperate if the three parts agree that the rational part lead (442c–d). They are just if each part of the soul attends to its function and not the function of another. It follows from this definition that one cannot be just if one doesn't have the other cardinal virtues.


title: Republic (Plato)

text: Socrates, having to his satisfaction defined the just constitution of both city and psyche, moves to elaborate upon the four unjust constitutions of these. Adeimantus and Polemarchus interrupt, asking Socrates instead first to explain how the sharing of wives and children in the guardian class is to be defined and legislated, a theme first touched on in Book III. Socrates is overwhelmed at their request, categorizing it as three "waves" of attack against which his reasoning must stand firm. These three waves challenge Socrates' claims that


title: Republic (Plato)

text: In Books V–VII the abolition of riches among the guardian class (not unlike Max Weber's bureaucracy) leads controversially to the abandonment of the typical family, and as such no child may know his or her parents and the parents may not know their own children. Socrates tells a tale which is the "allegory of the good government". The rulers assemble couples for reproduction, based on breeding criteria. Thus, stable population is achieved through eugenics and social cohesion is projected to be high because familial links are extended towards everyone in the city. Also the education of the youth is such that they are taught of only works of writing that encourage them to improve themselves for the state's good, and envision (the) god(s) as entirely good, just, and the author(s) of only that which is good.