46
PARTISAN REVIEW
feeling, since the fascist attitude is feminine and expresses the pas–
sion of a woman for her lover.
The emotional behavior of fascism-and this is its strength–
finds itself adapted to the historical role which the economic struc–
ture of our age allows the bourgeoisie to play. This role is reaction–
ary, and the political and emotional behavior of fascism is already
leading man towards a catastrophe. Communists too must adapt
their emotional behavior to the exigencies imposed upon them by
the historical role they have to play. No transformation of eco–
nomic life will be possible unless a desire to transform their
environment animates revolutionaries. It is an imperious necessity,
urgent and pressing, that the proletariat be dominated anew by
sadistic behavior.
That which the proletarian loves, does not yet exist; that which
he hates, oppresses him.
Comrades, be cruel!
NOWHERE
IS
THE FORCE of the opposition offered to the con·
formist ethic by the revolutionary ethic expressed with greater
violence than in love. It is urgent that the forces of revolution be
re-trained, that the men of our party become cruel men, yet men
who, despite their cruelty, remain capable of being moved and of
loving. Sadism should not be created at the expense of the general
emotional development. Quite the contrary, we should consider
this development an enlarging of the entire personality.
Let the child learn to do more than admire the beauty of
flowers and the intelligence of bees; let us show him the pleasure
of killing animals! Let him go hunting, let him visit the butcher's,
let him enjoy suffering.
If
we want him to become strong, blood
should not frighten him. Since he must hate, since he must suffer,
since he will see beings dear to him die of hunger, of pain, of dis–
appointment, let him be trained the better to endure the laws of
such a life-the life of a society divided into classes, which is the
only society we know and that he will be able to know.
It
is not for
us to teach him to live in peace, if we want to make a fighter out of
him. Since so much blood is to flow in life, let him get used to
wounds and the taste and the smell of blood. The child ought not
to turn his eyes away from life, but should look it in the face! The
