I've noticed that every time Freud comes up in discussion some one rolls their eyes and comments on how everything with Freud is about sex and your mother. Then he is just negatively dismissed as if that is all there is to say about him. Why is it so cool to be so dismissive of Freud? I don't agree with everything he says, but I do think he deserves more credit than he seems to be getting. If I was going to fit Freud in a nutshell, I probably wouldn't mention his mother or sex. I would probably sum him up with the iceberg. I think Freud got some stuff wrong, but why the lack of respect for what he got right? Columbus didn't land in India, but nobody is holding that against him.
Psychology was not around before Freud. Psychoanalysis did not exist. He was a medical doctor who thought that our dreams could give us insight to our emotional and social problems. His concepts of unconscious and repression are now ingrained in our culture. I think that is pretty impressive. He is not the last person to say that we stop development at an early age. In my opinion if he had spent some time working with and observing children, he would have gotten even more right. Is it because of the penis envy? Is it because we just don't like people focusing on the taboo? Why do we roll our eyes at Freud?
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3 comments:
My guess is that a lot of people do realize that parental issues and sexuality are incredible influences on our lives, and people don't like the fact that they can be analyzed. Freud is just the messenger that they end up shooting. :)
I think most people get caught up with the more...racy bits of his theories, and don't know that he also did a lot of foundational work for psychoanalysis. I think those who roll their eyes only know Freud because of penis envy and the Oedipal complex.
In popular culture Freud has been reduced to "a cigar isn't always a cigar" and the Oedipal complex, so the eye-rolling comes more from the lack of understanding and misrepresentation of his work.
And don't worry ladies, Freud didn't leave you out. He has the Elektra complex for you.
I was more of a Jung guy when I studied psychology.
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