Equally serious is the complaint that psychoanalysis as a medical practice is a form of oppressive social control, labelling individuals and forcing them to conform to arbitrary definitions of normality. This charge is in fact more usually aimed against psychiatric medicine as a whole: as far as Freuds own views on normality are concerned, the accusation is largely misdirected. Freuds work showed, scandalously, just how plastic and variable in its choice of objects libido really is, how so-called sexual perversions form part of what passes as normal sexuality, and how heterosexuality is by no means a natural or self-evident fact. It is true that Freudian psychoanalysis does usually work with some concept of a sexual norm; but this is in no sense given by Nature.
freud heterosexuality libido nature norms psychiatry sexuality

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About Terry Eagleton

Terry Eagleton.

Themes

  • Nature — Appreciation for the natural world and our place within it

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