Freud and Marxism.

[Bijou Drains]

Perhaps I didn’t make my points as well as I could.

I am not making the case for individualism per se, and I am certainly not saying that we don’t share common experiences, common class relationships, similar experiences of alienation, similar experiences of struggle to live a fulfilled life in a world that aims to mould us into a merely productive unit in the interests of capital accumulation.

What I do disagree with is an over mechanical response to how we develop personality.

I would also say that there are also divergent personalities and that the one size fits all view of personality development theorists such as Freud and Reich is not based on scientific examination or the reality of human life, and is also frankly laughable.

The development of personality is, in my view, far more nuanced than that. I am of the view that early year experiences of nurture and cooperative care have a huge impact on the development of personality, and there is a huge amount of imperical evidence to support that, in huge contrast to the semi mystical ravings of Freud, Jung and his like.

I would go so far as to say that cooperativeness and mutuality are more or less hard wired into us, a bit like a biological version of Kropotkin’s Mutual Aid. I would say there is a “Human Nature argumen”t, but that it supports the socialist viewpoint, rather than the anti socialist viewpoint.

Also I should have explained that the point I was making regarding attachment and polictical viewpoints was based on US research which equates “Liberal” with progressive and more open mind approaches to society.

I was not saying that means that that in itself that this is a positive thing.
Also I was not saying that liberal and progressive views are going to make the world better in any way.

What I was trying to say, in perhaps a cack handed way, is that this research indicates that there is likely to be a greater number of people who tend to view cooperativeness, interdependency, concepts of mutualism and affinity as positive and helpful activities for society, as opposed to having views that support self interest, rigidity of thought and individualism. This is despite all of the depridations of capitalism!

My view is that this gives us Socialists fertile ground to build on these attributes, that allows them to understand the class nature of society, and would allow them to see the possibility of creating a society that allows them to fully express their cooperativeness, mutuality and affinity for their fellow human being

[h.moss@swansea.ac.uk]

Souns good to me.

[Author]

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