Essay Sample: A Comparison of Repression Between Jennifer Freyd and Sigmund Freud

The equal contribution of the thought made by Jennifer Freyd and Sigmund Freud in their presentation of the characteristics of "repression" enhances the considerable contribution of comparable aspects throughout their literary to show human psychological containment of pain internalizing ability. The personality ego of repressing harm has been showing by both psychologists to determine the coping mechanism made in the brain to overcome the issues faced. The works of both thinkers are not a replica of representation but have common concepts in their objectivity on "repress". The tenets of portrayed in the successful functionality of the mind to enhance survival, the exploration of accountability of the personality traits are objects, basis and motivator. Based on this essence, Freud and Freyd identify how objects identify compromising situations, but positive motivators give the objects the basis of repression. This resume will make considerable efforts to compare and contrast the use of repression by Sigmund Freud in his "An Outline of Psycho-Analysis" and Jennifer Freyd's "Betrayal Trauma: The Logic of Forgetting Childhood Abuse". The aim of this work will not capitalize in showing the strengths of one thinkers' argument about the others, but, will explain the similarities and differences applied in teaching the considerable use of repression in their texts.

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Both Freyd and Freud make similar attempts to signify "repression" as the resultant of necessitated resilience activated by the function and will for survival by objects. Though, they used different terminologies to show the reason and cause of repress in an individual's mind. Their contribution to this school of thought shows considerable similarity that has an equal share of disputing representations. The primary similarity in the duo exemplifies the commonness of the same concept. According to Freud, the process of repression emanates from the process of resistance. An extraction from Freud's text, he states: "in accordance to hypothesized scenarios, the ego must realize and satisfy the demand raised by the three principles dependent - the superego, the identity, and reality. Through effective execution of dismissal of aspects intimidating one's individuality, the gained self-image is used to preserve the individual's ego's organization and effective maintenance of autonomy" (49). Moreover, Freud exemplifies the practical application of "repression" in a disapproving situation of life. He states: "if a young boy experiences sexual desires for his mother, to want to be intimate with her, the father of the child reprimands his perceived behavior to suppress the child's mind on the urge to engage in such acts to sustain healthy relationship with "reality" or else the father is hysterical. Repression is organic and natural resistance to the id and the superego cues the identification of function" (35). Inactive causation of Freud's representation of "repression" signifies the reprimand of fleshly desires that are refutable in social norms for the actions of inappropriate thought or behaviour experienced by objective repression. In the exemplified issue the child's sexual desire and the idealization of sexual engagement towards his mother forms the objective repression in the example. The social condemnation that such a child would receive to materialize such idealization of the mother in his grope. Freud's representation of the ideology of the object of repression condemns the suppression of the sexual desire. He says: "the young and feeble personality withdraws the unconscious position of acquired resources absorbed, some materials get rejected leaving traces in the id spoken off the only re-revised standard of the id as repressed" (36). In this context, Freud shows the function of the human brain id to repress fleshly desires or to specific identifiers to tactfully urge the ego on the measure of accessible information. In this argument, it's practical to borrow from Sigmund Freud the notion that the ego adopts repression as a function of the mind to id unconstitutional desires.

Jennifer Freyd, in a similar context, symbolizes "repression" as a distinct function of the human mind. In her theory, Freyd hypothesizes that repression automates pain, betrayal, and the urge or motivation for survival. She furthers this definition of repression by stating that pain motivated change would result in a dangerous revelation of character thus prompting suppression (p.129). Repression is an active tool for survival that suppresses the detected betrayal or retrogressive knowledge that allows a sexually abused child to be able to live and benefit from the perpetrator. In her effort to explain the adoption of children after molest, Fredy shows the strong existence of repression in children as a function of the mind. She says: "if betrayal by a trusted caregiver is key to predicting amnesia for abuse, the attachment is key to understanding why amnesia is adaptive in instances of such betrayals" (69). Repressing memory is motivated to function or activate by the urge to forget or ignore a hurting situation. A molested child by primary caregivers helps to repress this knowledge of betrayal in the memory to preserve their attachment to the perpetrator.

Both Freud and Freyd maintain similarity when showing the practical application of repression in stressful life situations. Fredy explores that the cause of oppression is not necessarily by the most severe pain experienced by the victim but the trauma that has betrayal ties as the instigating elements of the pain. She says that: "the proposition of repression points to the central role of social relationships in traumas with the urge to be forgotten" (63). In this argument, Freyd shows the importance of activation of repression due to betrayal for a child to maintain the relationship with the perpetrator of harm. Freud eludes with this point of thought when he states: "the preconditioned pathological states of mind is relative or absolute to the ego that achieves impossible tasks doable" (49). Just like Freyd, Freud demonstrates that the objects of repression emanate from the classification of disapproving ego or desires that threaten the ego without placing a victim in a vulnerable predicament. These two thinkers classify the minds function in repression to show the adaptive measure to fight circumstance based on the motivators of regression as a function for the urgency of survival. Their illustrations on the instigating elements of repression to be an activation of objects that cause the tasks of survival.

The contrast in how the two psychologists apply the use of repression in their text shows the considerable significance of each context to sharpen the logical sense of the objective adoption of suppressed ideas. Freud adopts the psychoanalytic theory of personality to demonstrate the level of consciousness and structural function of character. He was able to show how the principles of self (ego), identity (id) function to repress disapproval in life. In line with the theory's tenets, Freud expounds on the elements of personal perception of the outward look in interpersonal relationships and the inner-self. He capitalizes on the false memory to preserve interpersonal links between subjects. In this same line of thought, Jennifer Freyd adopted the betrayal trauma theory that demonstrates the principles of concealing painful experiences as adaptive strategies to live with a false memory. In both incidences, the two psychologists show the different ways repression of the human mind takes different principles but achieves the same goals - hiding the exact situation to suppress an adoptable position.

In this context, both Freud and Freyd give the objective and problematic part of the human brain's psychology, but, their ways of presenting the arguments of repression differ. They explore the idea of sexual exploitation among children. In Freyd's demonstration of repressive mindset, she explains the child subjected to sexual abuse as the object while the idea to forget the incidence to continue living with the offence perpetrator as the cause to enhance survival. The way Freyd demonstrate this type of memory suppression shows one part of the applications of repression in life. It proved the adaptive mechanism of pain by the oppressed around their oppressors. In a different context, Freud demonstrates the form of restraint when a young boy sexually desires his biological mother, the father's condemnation of the boy's intimate thought towards the mother. In this example of repression, the disapproval of the situation provoking human mind condemns the unacceptable situation emerging in the human brain to forget the extreme sexual desires to maintain social norms. In this pretext, both psychologists use different instigating measures that constitute unacceptable situations. In the Freyd's example, she shows the avoidance of thoughts on issues brought about by pain while differently Freud shows how disapproving circumstances requires repression of the mind. The two different ways used to indicate how conflict shape personality gives the two works considerable contribution to the role of suppression in human life.

The practical application of the demonstrations of Freyd gives the conscious part of the human brain that subjects to pain and adverse experiences. The victims of sexual abuse from caregivers have to live with the offence perpetrated to them and at the same time live with the perpetrator as they depend on them. As Freyd parades the misgiving situation of the sexually abused children, they have no options but to ignore and forget the pain they suffered to adopt a false memory that will enable them to live with the perpetrator without reflecting on the painful incidence. Freud used the unconscious level of the mind that shapes personality. In this demonstration, Freud shows how the unconscious manifestation of ideas that gives the wrong impression of nature in the society subject a young boy's desires to condemnation due to the explicitness of his unconscious desires. The boy has to suppress the obscene thought to maintain social order. The application of repression in the two philosophical views shows how the conscious and unconscious level of human mind contributes to false memory.

In conclusion, the works of Jennifer Freyd and Sigmund Freud make considerable contribution to the repression of the human mind drawing a lot of similarities in their approach of conflict as an element of shaping early childhood personality. The different contexts the two thinkers apply the repression mind gives a two-sided application of the same concept.

References

Freud, S. (1937). Analysis terminable and interminable. Standard Edition, vol. XXIII. London: Hogarth.

Freud, S. (1940). Splitting of the ego in the process of defence. Standard Edition, vol. XXIII. London: Hogarth.

Freyd, J. J. (1996). Betrayal trauma: The logic of forgetting childhood abuse. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.