The Silent Kill. Male and Female Destructiveness in Psychoanalytic Practice¹

Abstract

Igra L. The Silent Kill. Male and Female Destructiveness in Psychoanalytic Practice. Int Forum Psychoanal 1992;1:139-147. Stockholm ISSN 0803-706X

There is an ongoing discussion where efforts are made to divine if there are specific gender related ways of expressing destructiveness. In the present paper the focus is primarily on the psychoanalytic encounter. The basic qualities of the psychoanalytic situation can, among other potential meanings, unconsciously be symbolized as a primal scene. This awakens hate in the infantile transference and attacks are directed against theses linking qualities of the analytic setting and against the link between analyst and analysand. In the analysands unconscious this is related to an incapacity to integrate masculine and feminine aspects of the personality. The impression is that the masculine destructiveness expresses itself as a cutting off, while the feminine destructiveness appears as a withdrawal. These differences emerge somewhat later in the development of the personality. These forms of destructiveness have to be related to the feeling of envy and exclusion in relation to the primal scene. The aim of psychoanalytic work in this area is the integration of split off areas of the personality.