Self and other

The situation gets even more confusing. Freud noticed that as the depressed person blames himself (rather than his father) for being unkind and ungenerous, he actually becomes unkind and ungenerous himself. In some weird way he becomes worthy of his self-criticism. Freud’s point is more radical than the by now familiar observation that if a person grows up in an unkind and ungenerous environment he is likely to imitate the behavior, and thus develop an unkind and ungenerous character. This may be true, and one can read accounts of it in Plato’s and Aristotle’s ethics.11 By contrast, Freud argues that this imitative, character-forming behavior is itself motivated by powerful fantasies, not simply to be like my father but to be him. These fantasies can be remarkably efficacious. It is not just that I am dreaming that I have become my father; I actually succeed in shaping my ego in my father’s image. (And thus when I blame myself for my unkindness, it is radically unclear who I am blaming.) Freud called this process identification.12 We need to know more about what identification is and how it works. In particular, how do people’s fantasies of being their mother or father actually shape who they are?