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scenario of the fifties has the husband coming home to a wife who terms
him an oppressor for monopolizing the exciting world of work . Yet the
exciting world ofwork is one in which most men are dominated , frustrated,
exploited .
Lasch :
Parsons himself seems to admit that it causes more forms of sickness
than it can cure . I suppose the usual way of dealing with this kind of
information, from sociologists of the family to social workers , is to argue
that familial therapy, and therapy in general, simply has to become more
effective . The burden of the new psychiatric movements one might
characterize collectively under the heading of psychiatric self-help seems to
be that people have to " get in touch with their feelings" and to become
more adept at performing therapeutic roles for each other. But what it often
seems to come down to , at least for marriage and the family, is that the
participants have to become more adept at absorbing various forms of
abuse .
Birnbaum :
Doesn't that impose moral demands upon the human personality
which are excessive? Freud's critique ofculture was that it imposed excessive
demands on a humanity little able to bear them, and that for most persons
the cost of what he termed" instinctual renunciation" was too high.
Lasch :
He was right.
Birnbaum :
This belief was connected not only with his critique of culture ; it
was part of something else in his philosophy, a critique of average
humanity . Only a cultural elite found, in his view, the rewards of culture
roughly in balance with the cost exacted from them. Where the very idea of
an elite is suspect, who will honor those who pay the price? Perhaps the
doctrine of limitless gratification is, as the traditionalists suspect, a not
entirely subtle form of cultural class warfare-or psychological guerilla
action .
The chief injustice Freud himself thought about was injustice in the
distribution ofgratification , with the family imposing one kind of restraint
and the idea of work another. If Freud was right , I do not see how you can
erect a defense of traditional values that are being eroded by new
developments . In fact , these values are based on illusions created by specific
historical conditions-in sum, on a notion of humanity which is neither
socially nor biologically tenable in the long run.
Lasch :
I should have added that although I think Freud was right in saying
that most people pay too high a price, it's becoming more and more clear
that the alternatives are no better.
Birnbaum :
I was going to say, not paying the price may be worse .
Lasch :
In " The Most Prevalent Form of Degradation in Erotic Life ," Freud's
analysis of what he calls psychic impotence amounts to a damning
