Eros and Thanatos

The id is desire itself, unconscious, divided into two hardwired drives Freud posits like geometric axioms rather than proves: Eros, toward love and pleasure; Thanatos, toward aggression and death.

Put simply Freud: the "id" is desire itself, and unconscious. It has two inborn drives that he assumes rather than proves: Eros, toward love and pleasure, and Thanatos, toward aggression and death.

In the text In The Ego and the Id (1923; Riviere translation), ch. IV, Freud writes of "two classes of instincts, one of which, Eros or the sexual instincts," and calls the other the death instinct.

Civilization is bought with repression of both drives: to live together people must curb sex and aggression alike, which is why society and individual fulfillment pull against each other.

Put simply Freud: civilization is paid for by holding back both our basic drives. To live together, people must curb sex and aggression alike, which is why society and personal fulfillment pull against each other.

Civilization, Freud writes, is largely "constantly created anew": every individual entering society must in turn give up instinctual satisfaction for the community's sake.

Put simply Freud: civilization is rebuilt in every generation, because each new person joining society must give up some satisfaction of their drives for the good of the community.

Against the Marxists, who expect aggressive instincts to fade once conditions change, Freud insists aggression is hardwired and older than private property, so no social rearrangement removes it.

Where to read it Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, ch. V.

The Bolsheviks' failing, in Reich's view, is that they have paid too little attention to sexual questions.

For Reich, sexual liberation cannot be achieved inside a capitalist order; the two are incompatible.

Where Freud saw repression as the unavoidable cost of living together, Marcuse sees an exit: the repression that matters is capitalism's, and its hold on the body might be undermined.

Put simply Marcuse: Freud thought repression was the unavoidable price of living together. Marcuse sees a way out: the repression that matters comes from capitalism, and its grip on our bodies might be loosened.

Eros and Thanatos compete for the same space, and the death drive can only occupy ground eros has vacated; so work rearranged to re-eroticize the body shrinks aggression.

Put simply Marcuse: the erotic drive ("Eros") and the death drive ("Thanatos") compete for the same ground, and aggression only fills space eroticism has left. So reorganizing work to re-eroticize the body would reduce aggression.

With Auschwitz, Hiroshima and Nagasaki in mind, Marcuse warns that unless capitalist sexual repression is reversed, annihilation will be our ultimate fate: the death drive will finish off the species.

Put simply Marcuse, writing in 1955 with Auschwitz and Hiroshima in mind: unless capitalism's sexual repression is reversed, annihilation is our fate, because the death drive, our urge to destroy, will finish off the species.

Beauvoir finds Freud as reductive as Marx: psychoanalysis swaps existential choice for hardwired drives and involuntary repression, a determinism she cannot accept, however seriously she takes sexuality.