And it occurs to me to comment that, while sexual energy can be highly destructive outside the family—obviously in the form infidelity, and following marital trauma, conflict, and in our culture divorce—it is vastly more destructive within the family. I don’t think we have yet begun to fully grasp the inter generational, long term effects of incest. And in global culture, I don’t think we have a clue even now how prevalent it is, and has perhaps always been. As open as the United States is, it has only been “on the table” for perhaps 40 years, since the early 1980’s.
Freud, remember, saw it in Vienna, and realized he had to choose between his career (and sense of self importance) and the truth. He chose, obviously, his career.
But can we plausibly believe we understand it’s extent in Islamic countries? In India? In China? In Japan? Everywhere else? I don’t think so.
I would stipulate that the core psychological task which alone can guarantee a healthy, adaptive, fair, prosperous, peaceful and happy society is psychological individuation, and I would assert this process is inherently the antithesis of cultish behavior.
The context of these comments, as is likely obvious, is the rise of what might be termed “political cultishness”, in our own, and many Westen societies. We are prosperous. We are free. And that is plainly not enough for far too many people. They feel lost, atomized, alone, and personally deficient.
When technology raises a child, can it truly be said the father was a father, and the mother a mother, even if both are present? I don’t think so.