Desire, Aspiration, and Competition Theme Analysis

Early in the book, Fanon argues that two questions are central to understanding the world: “What does man want?” and “What does the black man want?” The separation of these two inquiries emphasizes Fanon’s argument that black people are excluded from the category of humanity, and also conveys that there are important distinctions between the desires of white people and desires of black people. Following the conventions of psychoanalysis, Fanon maintains that desire must be the primary subject of any inquiry into human behavior.

Fanon argues that black people are taught to desire whiteness, and it is for this reason that many black people (both women and men) also desire white romantic and sexual partners. However, in his examination of this phenomenon, Fanon highlights differences between the ways in which black women desire white men and the ways in which black men desire white women. Fanon proposes that black women choose to date and marry white men because they have been taught to feel disgust and disapproval of blackness. They have been conditioned to believe that black men are dirty, unintelligent, irresponsible, and inferior—and that white men represent the opposite of these characteristics. According to Fanon, black women’s rejection of black men is thus a form of self-hatred, even if they themselves do not recognize it as such. As a result of internalized racism, black women wish to distance themselves from blackness, and this produces their desire for white men. Fanon suggests that black men’s desire for white women is a little different. He argues that black men feel a sense of competition with other men, and that this makes them want to “win” the most prized object within the colonial sexual economy: white women. Fanon then asserts that black men’s desire for white women can be almost vengeful in nature—a way of asserting their own power in the face of racist oppression.

Fanon also explores other ways in which black people are taught to aspire to whiteness. Just as lower classes are taught to aspire to bourgeois identity, black people are encouraged to “assimilate” and imitate white ways of thinking, speaking, and behaving. As a result, black people suppress the aspects of themselves associated with blackness and instead imitate whiteness in order to prove their own humanity to white people. However, this is a rigged game, since a black person can never truly make themselves white, and—no matter how convincingly they strive to behave like a white person—will never be fully accepted into white society. Aspiring to whiteness will only create a deeper sense of self-hatred within the black person.

Fanon also examines how nonwhite people compete with one another in their aspiration for whiteness, causing bitterness and lack of solidarity between and within non-white communities. He writes: “The Frenchman does not like the Jew, who does not like the Arab, who does not like the black man.” The stark injustices of racism mean that black people are not even presented with the opportunity to compete with white people, and thus instead pit themselves against other non-white people. Once again, this competitiveness ultimately only serves to reinforce white supremacy.

Fanon also discusses the feelings of desire white people have for black people. He mentions the fetishizing of black athletes, white women’s sexual fantasies about black men, and white men’s fears about black men’s supposed sexual superiority. Like other psychoanalysts, Fanon argues that sexual desire and competitiveness are deeply embedded into the racial order and are in fact one of the great causes of racial prejudice and oppression. Even as white people harbor deeply racist views about black people, they also feel desire toward them—however unconscious that desire may be. Fanon writes that in colonial and postcolonial culture, the black person “is yearned for; white men can’t get along without him.” Desire, aspiration, and competition are thus major elements of the psychic foundation of racism.