Civilisation and its discontents

To my mind one of the wisest things Freud does in Civilisation and its Discontents is to question the famous (religious) precept: "Love thy neighbour as thyself", using the simple notion of the economy of the libido (it is not unlimited). He does it in such an accessible manner that, because it's not the point he drives at, its importance almost passes you by: your friends and family demand your love, by giving it to everyone equally you are diminishing its value. It is easy to understand - and reminds me of something else I read once, which was in fact a great help: "a friend to all is a friend to none."

A more difficult question to answer (and he does not do so in CAID, but I think he does elsewhere) is why some people's actions and thoughts should benefit humanity at large. Why is it possible for a Mother Theresa or a Gandhi or a Van Gogh to move and speak to people far, far removed from them?

Some may say that we are touched through symbolic thought, but that is a very partial explanation. I read something about mirror neurons the other day - apparently people who are themselves good dancers bring the parts of their brains that are active during dancing, into play when they watch other people dancing. These people like Jesus and Miro - who are special people, lest we forget - manage to communicate what most are aware of in themselves but find largely inexpressible. They thereby bring it into consciousness in a way akin to the static dancers' experience of watching others dancing.

I watched Taxi Driver yesterday - finally, for so many years I used to check out the VHS cover and determine that "I have to see this some time" - and it is just brilliant. It amplifies issues that just cannot be presented without the gifts of the people behind this movie - and I think Scorsese in particular.

At any rate, it's a very controversial movie as well, and I couldn't help wondering about Travis' aggression in the movie. You know, he is "authentic" with his instinctual tendencies (he takes Betsy to a soft porn movie for a date! :-), but when Betsy snubs him he suddenly shows this aggressive side that you think "Wow! this guy is a bit dangerous!", but then you also know exactly how he feels, and one of my favourite comic scenes is when another cabbie, whom he looks to for some fatherly advice, gives him some of the most useless advice known to man. And Travis has the good Grace to grin and say: "That's probably the dumbest thing I ever heard."

Thing is, I couldn't help thinking of Freud later - you know, since I read CAID recently - and thought: yeah, Travis' Eros drive was thwarted; now he has all this pent up energy and feels society has turned its back on him nevermind that he is doing what he can for the would-be president. Steps in the Thanatos drive, the theme of CAID, and rather than turning it inward (earlier in the movie he states his intention to be a good, normal person "like other people", and disapproves of what he calls "morbid self-attention") he starts turning it (his aggression) outward - and, of course, eventually towards the "scum" of New York that he so hates. The movie, really, seems like a coming-of-age story - but not in individualistic terms: it's not a boy's dream to become a man, but a foreigner's dream to become accepted in the society he has come to live in (new York, America), i.e. to become a citizen.

So the last sequence where he gives Betsy a lift for free is about the fact that they are now equal. What she represented to him at first (society, doing one's duty, being a citizen) he has now attained himself (ironically, he has "become his job", just like the other cabbie said, but he has also gained dignity).

PS: If that conclusion sounds slightly stale, bear in mind that this is New York, 1975. Oh, to be 26! and living in New York! in 1975 ..!