Quote:
Originally Posted by Alffe
I am really glad that you have PJ Mark...those meds are so often necessary evils.
You people have been making me think too much. Am rereading a fairly new text book..the anniversary edition of Synopsis of Psychiatry by Kaplan and Sadock's and it's amazing how little has changed since Durkheims theory at the end of the 19th century. I moved passed him to Freud's Theory and his belief that that suicide represents aggression turned inward against an introjected, ambivalently cathected love object.
Freud doubted that there would be a suicide without an earlier repressed desire to kill someone else.  I never did "get" Freud!
And then I came to Menningers's Theory...(he's my kind of guy)...now I have to find The Trout.  |
Hello, Alffe: Thanks for your comment; I'd say YOU are the one who makes us think. And feel...
What little I know of Freud: humans have 2 drives, toward life (Eros) and toward death (Thanatos). In the latter, cells are inclined to return to their original inert state. All I can say is, the Thanatos theory may be true, but nobody has done much of anything with it. It remains undeveloped; its explanatory power, as of today, has not been established.
Freud certainly is exciting to read in places; he stirs something up in the unconscious; you agree or disagree strongly. I get the feeling that he tries too hard to cram EVERYTHING into his theory, instead of just saying his theory can explain many things, but not everything.
Durkheim, as I understand him, held that suicide was due more to group (or sociological) reasons than individual (or psychological) ones. He mentioned egoistic suicide (the loner, not socially integrated enough) and the altruistic suicide (too much integrated; person doesn't see himself as an individual). A soldier who volunarily gives his life for others, is an example. Then there is anomic suicide (caused by social breakdown of traditions, etc.), and finally fatalistic suicide, which Durkheim thought was rare, among overregulated people such as slaves. He passes over them; I suspect they are becoming more and more important.
I think my own case had elements of all 4 types. Psychological elements, too, so Durkheim, like Freud, doesn't explain everything. Anyway, Durkheim's discussion is very stimulating. I thank you, Alffe, for bringing it up.
Bestest, Tom