528
QUESTIONS OF GUILT
get hopelessly mixed together with guilt feelings . But where we differ,
I think, is that, although we both say guilt is going to be with us to
a great extent, I see a certain form of guilt as enormously important and
useful. But the self-destructive element should also be pointed out,
be–
cause that is indeed what neurotic guilt is about.
FARBER: I'd like to talk about what one does when one is pre–
sented by another with, say, guilt feelings of the type "I am worth–
less." I think what one does is to pursue the ways in which he con–
siders himself worthless, to understand , as various psychoanalysts do,
the ways in which this feeling of worthlessness may be inauthentic in
itself, may hide something more. But as to real guilt, I think it is the
most difficult thing in the world.
It
is especially problematical for the
psychoanalyst, for although it is hardly acknowledged in psychoanalytic
theory, the search for illumination is one in which the analyst must
often join his patient.
PETER BROOKS: Bob, I'm willing to accept your notion of collective
guilt, but doesn't it necessitate more attention than you've given to the
idea of collectivity. What is the maximum useful collectivity in sensing
guilt; and doesn' t it always produce a response of another collectivity,
which is the response that one might usefully call for the moment the
response of innocence? You seem to be implying that living in Ameri–
ca in the year 1972 is sufficient cause in itself for being guilty. I really
wish that were true, but I don' t think it is. In the reactions of your
Vietnam veterans, isn't this almust a universal differentiation? When
you have a collectivity that's felt a guilt, another collectivity will have
to reject this guilt.
LIFTON: Living in America now in 1972 is sufficient cause to feel
guilty, but that doesn't mean that the ma jority of Americans so feel.
I think that's a distinction. And there, the cause and effect of guilt,
or the causative factors and the nature of one's experience or non–
experience of guilt, are very complicated and really have to do with
the way in which the experience of guilt is itself reinforced. As for
the dangers of a collectivity or, let's say, a shared sense of guilt cre–
ating in another group, in this case take the North Vietnamese, a
sense of total innocence, it does exist, because communities tend to
juxtapose themselves.
BROOKS: But even leavjng out the question of the North Viet–
namese, what makes you think that America is the effective collectivity
in this case?
LIFTON: I don' t know that America is the effective collectivity.
but we are talking about a particular situation in which America is
(
involved. We're talking from inside of America, as Americans.
If
you're
\
asking if America is the effective collectivity for the \\·orld's dilemmas,
no, I don't think so. But I think the model of greater awareness or
sensitivity to killing, in direct or metaphorical ways, of others or of
oneself, is a useful model.
PHILLIPS: Bob, I wanted to ask you: guilty of what? You keep
saying guilty, but guilty of what? I'm consumed by the sense of guilt
as you talk, but I can't figure out what I'm guilty of.
