But the disenchantment of American intellectuals with psychoanalytic ideas, as with the earlier disenchantment with Marxist ideas (a parallel case), is premature. Marxism is not Stalinism or the suppression of the Hungarian revolution; pschoanalysis is not the Park Avenue analyst or the psychoanalytic journals or the suburban matron discussing her child's Oedipus complex. Disenchantment is the characteristic posture of contemporary American intellectuals, but disenchantment is often the product of laziness. We are not tenacious enough about ideas, as we have not been serious or honest enough about sexuality.
But the disenchantment of American intellectuals with psychoanalytic ideas, as with the earlier disenchantment with Marxist ideas (a parallel case), is premature. Marxism is not Stalinism or the suppression of the Hungarian revolution; pschoanalysis is not the Park Avenue analyst or the psychoanalytic journals or the suburban matron discussing her child's Oedipus complex. Disenchantment is the characteristic posture of contemporary American intellectuals, but disenchantment is often the product of laziness. We are not tenacious enough about ideas, as we have not been serious or honest enough about sexuality.