EXISTO

“Let us stay human,” we told each other in the dark times. But we did not yet know that the dark was blacker than what we could see.

To stay human, we must first bring back to mind what being human means: we have forgotten it, between an egoism of survival and an ever more boundless thirst for power.

And yet the solution was already written. After the world wars we sat down around a table and put it in black and white: the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. If you respect the human being, you don't wage wars, you fight famine, you care for your land. It is all there: respect the human being and you save the world. It is disarmingly simple.

But if it does not come from below, it does not work. If the one holding a rifle does not stop shooting of his own will, it does not work.

One voice saying “I exist” is a madman. A million voices claiming their existence is a political act.

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EXISTO does one thing: it lets you say it. I exist. Not a profile, not a number in a statistic: a person. Whoever says it receives the passport of humankind — Planet Earth · Nation Earth · Humankind — and joins the line of those who are here.

No ads. No rankings. No data beyond the minimum.

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The human being and the beast

A newborn is a human being — born free and equal in dignity and rights, says Article 1, and no one can take that away. But look at him: he eats, sleeps, cries, grabs. He behaves like a little animal, and it is no fault of his: he cannot choose yet.

Then he learns. He learns that food can be shared instead of snatched. That one can wait, understand, apologize, defend someone who is nothing to him. Everything we call humanity — no one carries it in their blood: it is learned. That is why it can also be unlearned. That is why we have forgotten it.

The beast follows instinct: hunger, fear, dominance. And the beast is innocent, because instinct is all it has.

The human being is the only animal that can look at its own instinct and say no. It can be hungry and share. It can be afraid and stay. It can have the power to crush, and not crush.

Those who shoot, who starve others, who trample — are not beasts. If only they were: they would be innocent. They are human beings who had the choice and did not use it. This is the only true guilt there is.

No one is a beast forever, no one is human once and for all. We choose every day, one action at a time.

Actions define us. And actions are chosen.

The only law: a human being respects a human being.