Concept
Moral masochism
The third form of masochism that Freud distinguished in Das ökonomische Problem des Masochismus (1924), beside erotogenic and feminine masochism. It has loosened its tie with sexuality: what matters is the suffering itself, whoever or whatever inflicts it, and the subject seeks out misfortune and failure. Freud traced it to an unconscious need for punishment, by which the ego offers itself to the sadism of the super-ego, and to a resexualisation of morality that revives the Oedipus complex.
- Introduced by
- Sigmund Freud
- Key works
- 1
- Related
- Unconscious sense of guilt
introduced by
- Sigmund Freud 1924 Das ökonomische Problem des Masochismus distinguishes erotogenic, feminine and moral masochism, and traces the last to an unconscious need for punishment, satisfied by the suffering the subject brings on himself.
derives from
- Unconscious sense of guilt 1924 Freud explains moral masochism by the unconscious sense of guilt, which he reformulates as a need for punishment at the hands of a parental power, and distinguishes the super-ego's heightened sadism from the ego's own masochism, which seeks the punishment.