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This essay aims to provide the reader with introspection into the feeling of Guilt. What it is? In what circumstances is it originated? Can Guilt be used as fuelling mechanism to commit crime? Is it possible for people to lack the feeling of Guilt and perform a criminal act? – Answering these questions is but the first step that this essay takes to try and describe it.
As most people would be able to give an example of when they have felt guilt, whether they have justified it to someone else or to themselves, just a handful have actually addressed the concept of Guilt. From Sigmund Freud’s theories, which have been expanded on by so many psychoanalysts and philosophers, to the analysis of Guilt from a neurological point of view, the origin of Guilt is always explained by one element which is part of the Human Nature: Behaviour.
This essay is merely an attempt to put these questions into perspective into today’s society and I will also embark in the contextualisation of different scenarios where Guilt or in some cases, the lack of, I should say, always plays an elemental part.
“A moral man is one who reacts to temptation as soon as he feels it in his heart, without yielding to it”, Sigmund Freud once said in the introductory essay “Dostoevsky and Parricide” he was asked to write for a scholarly collection on “The Brothers Karamazov”, written by Fyodor Dostoevsky in 1928. Freud’s essay falls into two distinct parts which discuss Dostoevsky’s character and his addictions. To understand the context of these assertions it is necessary to explore the modern day for examples and comparisons.
At page 1771 in “Dostoevksy and Parricide”, Freud makes two assertions, in summary - the
first one is “a moral man is one who reacts to temptation […] without yielding to it” and the second one is a man that commits murder and does penance for it, till penance is the driving force for enabling murder, this being characteristic to the Russian trait. A modern day example of where guilt is the fuelling mechanism for its own justification is Terrorism and racially aggravated crime. Following Brexit there was a sharp increase of racially aggravated crime, with the justification used to cover an individual’s personal hatred towards the victims and internally justifies his feeling of guilt as being in line with the rest of the society, which may explain one of the reasons why the feeling of guilt can be circumvented or offset altogether.
Sigmund Freud argues in his “Doestoevsky and Parricide” essay that two traits need to be present in the criminal mind. Firstly he asserts there needs to be a limitless sense of egoism and secondly a strong destructive urge. However, he has trouble reconciling Dostoevsky being a criminal de facto, and at the very least finds him to be a sadomasochist with a destructive personality. When we compare these two elements to modern day principles of criminality, we can say that destructive personalities sit alongside recklessness. Therefore, it would be possible to argue that Dostoevsky would possess a criminal mind in today’s context, but as a criminal mind on its own is not enough to constitute a crime per se, it does show repressed intention.
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When looking at the law of probability, anyone who possesses a destructive personality, at some point it is likely to commit a reckless act. This can be linked to guilt, in the sense that subconsciously, the individual is punishing himself with not caring at all, instead of punishing themselves for a particular act. Freud’s particular take on this matter is analysed in his view of the Oedipus complex and also the Primal Horde, when he states that guilt sees its dawn as part of the basic human feelings from the killing of the Father.
In the Oedipus myth, the killing of the Father by the infant is taken to action in order to eliminate the fear of Castration that the father represents to the infant, which has an inbuilt attachment and desire to possess the mother.
In that same line, Carl Gustav Jung, Freud’s student and collaborator, expands on a feminine version of the Oedipus myth which he called the “Electra complex” in 1913. Carl Jung’s view exports that castration anxiety the boy has into a Penis Envy.
The two concepts of Castration Anxiety and Penis Envy play elemental parts in the boy’s and the girl’s development into adulthood and the way guilt is interiorised and then criminal behaviour is developed.
According to Freud, the psyche presents 3 stages, the Id, the Ego and the Super-Ego. The Id is the primary stage in the development of the child’s psyche, where the source of all
behaviour is Pleasure without any limitations. Not unlike the Id, the Ego seeks pleasure, but as the individual is acknowledging the external norms from society and their rationalisation is made, the Ego seeks pleasure while avoiding the negative consequences that society would inflict if social etiquette and rules are breached.
The external norms that society, which are passed unto the youngest members and affect the Ego and the Id are the Super-Ego – the Other. The Super-Ego’s function is to mould the Id through the Ego.
Having regarded the concepts of Id, Ego and Super-Ego, when we take to the concepts of
Castration Anxiety and Penis Envy it is quite easily established that they are part of the Super-Ego. The issue arises and Guilt appears when the Super-Ego if it does not partially fail to limit the Id through the Ego in regards to the possession of the other sex parent and the sexual attraction they feel for them at a young age, they create a new relationship between the Id, the Ego and the Super-Ego: Guilt. That is Guilt for wanting something that the social norms – the Super-Ego dictate they should not have or even desire.
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the function of the other peripheral parts, aka the rest of the body. Parting from this
understanding of the computer as an amalgam of parts, as big or small as they may be, are built in the same way. That same principle applies to the brain itself, insofar the form it has at birth, before the internalisation of the external input begins.
Guilt is but one of the feelings that we internalise, but as Freud, Carl Jung, Jacque Lacan and even Renata Salecl all seem to be analysing in their visions of the human psyche, it is one of the most important feelings that the human brain has created and is elemental for all
interactions with the external world. When we reconcile the Freudian concept of guilt with the physical understanding of the brain, we begin our understanding of the “software” itself – the learned and shared behaviour, the social contract.
If we take the example of a child who has a parental structure that reprimands them for a socially correct behaviour and commends them for a socially incorrect behaviour at a young age, which can lead the child to develop a program in adulthood which completely
misunderstands and eradicates guilt. This can be seen in cases of paedophilia, where the perpetrator commits sexual acts whilst not displaying any remorse or guilt.
Revisiting the concept of that Ego-Super Ego conflict which results in the creation of guilt, we have to look at how Dostoevsky viewed guilt, at a subconscious level. It is a widely known fact that Fyodor Dostoevksy suffered from a form of Epilepsy, which had not taken full form, de facto until the death of his father, as Sigmund Freud seems to indicate in his essay2. Freud’s view on the matter is that Dostoevksy in fact suffered from Neurosis and calls
his epilepsy “hystero-epilepsy” or “affective epilepsy”. The reason he has for doing so is because he links Dostoevsky’s attacks with the death of his father for which Dostoevsky had been harbouring a deep hatred.
Further in his development as an Existentialist writer, Fyodor Dostoevsky joined the
Petrashevsky Circle, whose activities and texts were declared illegal by the Tsar Nicholas I. Subsequently, Dostoevsky was arrested for his association with the Circle and sentenced to death, only to be exiled to Siberia for 5 years and afterwards to serve in the Tsar’s army.
Again, if we analyse Dostoevsky’s behavior in regards to Guilt, the Ego and the Super-Ego, we can ascertain that he joined the Circle as a form of rebellion against his father, as he was sent to military school, where he was unable to fit in, due to his complete apathy for the army’s activities. It can be said that by joining the Circle, he was also looking for punishment for a crime he had not in fact committed but felt guilty for, his father’s death.
Based on the principle of commission of a wrongful act, parting from the feeling of guilt that an individual feels for an act that he, himself, has not in fact, committed, I propose the
situation of an individual whose actions and certain omissions ultimately lead to his untimely death, despite him not being guilty of anything, but for not reaching today’s society’s
demands – and his parents’.
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In order to expand on the concept of guilt, I thought it was necessary to reflect upon my personal experiences. For the purposes of this essay, I shall name the case study in question as “A”.
A was a 15 years old teen-ager. He wore glasses, had a very friendly way about himself and had always seemed very happy and had a wide group of friends. He was very well known and respected in a multitude of social circles, especially in the local Theatre Scene. So far, he seemed as average as any other 15 year old individual with an affinity for the artistic arts.
What was not publicly apparent about him was that he suffered from epilepsy and was under constant medication for it.
One day, upon returning from work, his mother discovers his lifeless body in the family’s kitchen with all the apparent signs that he had died from a convulsive epileptic attack, which the coroner further confirmed.
Initially, given all the particulars of his untimely death, one is lead to think that A was not taking his medication, which was also confirmed to be the case. But why would he deliberately not take his medication?
The first reason was deemed to be the fact that he could not function at the level he was being required to function to achieve all the targets that he had been setting for himself, whilst on the medication.
Based on the principle of Guilt that arises from the Ego-Super Ego conflict that Freud proposes, we are required to consider the following for the purposes of A’s case: first, the Super Ego, his parents and society itself had imprinted an ideology of over-achievement, which seems to be very present in today’s day and age – if you do not achieve everything it is expected of you, you, the Ego, are not deemed good enough to be part of the social
aggrupation that surrounds you, and a pathological neurosis is established and guilt arises.
For A, once a highly praised student, which achieved all he set himself up to achieve, this situation of Guilt was inevitable. A knew that if he had stopped taking the medication for a period of more than 7 to 10 days, he would stop feeling the secondary effects of the
medication and he would be able to function at his maximum capacities, but what he also knew was that not taking the medication for that long would also pose a serious risk to his health. The guilt alone that he felt for not providing his parents with the results they were expecting of him, even though he was overworked, pushed him to commit a self-punishing act, which then led to his own destruction.
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Dostoyevsky to improve his literary production. Over a continuous period of time, as his work would improve, the self-inflicted punishment would decrease.
There is always one criminal behaviour which constantly raises concerns in today’s society and that is Paedophilia. It is such a taboo behaviour, that most paedophiles that are sent to prison are considered “marked men”3. But why do paedophiles engage in this type of criminal
act?
As paedophilia is such an important matter, maybe the most frown upon criminal act, even by other violent offenders, I would like to take this opportunity and take a quick glance at one of the most important cases referred to the CPS in the UK – the case of Jimmy Savile.
Born in 1926 in Leeds as the youngest of seven children, Savile grew up without a father role model. It is established from a radio interview from 1992 that he was materially and
emotionally deprived growing up, as his mother, often called “the duchess” by Savile, never showed him tactile affection.4 Their relationship extended over a large period of time, as “the
duchess” died in 1972, when Savile was 46 years old. It is noted in the interview that she took care of him for the first of his life and he took care of her for the second part of her life. Upon the death of the mother, Savile spent 5 days with her corpse. He claims as follows:
“We hadn’t put her away yet and there she was lying around so to me they were good times, they were not the best times.”
“I’d much rather that she hadn’t died but it was inevitable therefore it had to be. Once upon a time I had to share her with a lot of people. We had marvellous times but when she was dead she was all mine, for me. So therefore it finished up right, you understand, and then we buried her.”
In the same interview Savile also claims that he hates children. (1992)
Spanning almost the entire course of all his adult life, Jimmy Savile, was reported to have committed 214 criminal sex offences across 28 police forces, between 1955 and 20095.
In the article published by the Guardian, entitled “Savile told hospital staff he performed sex acts on corpses in Leeds mortuary”6, it is reported by a former nurse in the Leeds general
infirmary that Savile would claim access to the mortuary from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s.
3https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/16/sex-offenders-killed-higher-rate-california-prison: “Sex offenders 'marked men' in California prison as many are killed at higher rate”, written by Associated Press in Sacramento, and published by The Guardian. 16 February 2015. Last accessed 10 January 2017.
4 https://www.channel4.com/news/how-jimmy-savile-revealed-all-in-the-psychiatrists-chair, Last accessed 10 January 2017.
5 https://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jun/26/jimmy-savile-sexual-abuse-timeline: ”Jimmy Savile: timeline of his sexual abuse and its uncovering”, written by Josh Halliday, 26 June 2014. Last accessed 10 January 2017
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Jimmy Savile was, in scope of Jacque Lacan’s interpretation of the concept of Perversion, as described by Jacque-Alain Miller in lecture he gave in New York in 1989.
“The pervert has found the object (the lost object – what we call desire) and is certain of his ways of obtaining sexual gratification […]”7
But rather than analysing Savile’s Drive, I would rather establish a link to a Guilt originated potentially in the Super-Ego.
As it was established, Savile grew up without a father figure, which according to Freudian psychoanalysis, would mean that the barrier that Jimmy Savile’s psyche would have
originated in the father figure in regards to the attraction or for the sake of the argument, the attachment, he would have towards his mother, “the duchess”, would have never been created. The Super-Ego would fail to mould the Id through the Ego and therefore his psyche would not have any boundaries.
First of all, in addition to not internalising boundaries in a socially accepted manner, he felt that he grew up with multiple types of deprivation, especially tactile from the person which, we gather from his biography, played a most important part in his life, his mother. Based on these elements, it could be very well established that he suffered from a deeply rooted
neurotic Oedipal Syndrome. This is further explained by the fact that he spent 5 days with her corpse claiming her only for himself, having to “had shared her with a lot of people”.
Having said that, the feeling of Guilt would appear in his mind - a Guilt for outliving his father, a Guilt for not being able to ever satisfy his mother, who would constantly make him feel powerless. The effects of this Guilt would manifest themselves in the shape of claim of power throughout his adulthood.
Second of all, it is necessary to look at the timeline, when he begins his abuses with more frequency, and that is in the late 70s. His mother passed away in 1972, and based on the exponential increase in abuses around the period until the end of his life, it is safe to ascertain that for Jimmy Savile, “the duchess” was a physical representation of his Guilt, external punishment, in an analogous way to what the Tsar represented for Dostoevsky.
Upon his mother’s death, not only did his external punishment die with her, but also, in a sense, his mental one died too. Upon her death, his internal Guilt diminished and he
embraced it, transforming it into a tool for his criminal behaviour. Alongside the sexual abuse he submits his victims to, 73% being children; he also adopts a new kind of deviancy,
Necrophilia, which he would pursue from the mid 70 to the late 90s.
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In relation to his Necrophilia, he would seem to have removed himself from the feeling of Guilt and the only thing that would drive him would be his Desire.
Jimmy Savile:
Super-Ego vs Ego => GUILT modifying Id
The Mother limiting Desire
This chart should explain in a more visual way the impact Savile’s Mother actually had on the limitations of his Criminal behaviour.
Jimmy Savile’s criminal actions, whilst in his earlier life, prior to his mother’s death might have had their origin in guilt, once she died, every type of limitation he might have imposed himself, died with her and he stopped feeling guilt altogether and a feeling of being invincible took over him. It is confirmed by his words which read:
“I’ve got the freedom to do pretty well anything now including being bored, or being alone or being with people or getting things, I suppose if I didn’t have that I would only see that as a temporary setback because somewhere my inventiveness is such that if I had everything taken away from me now it wouldn’t be long before I got it back again.”
On a separate note, it has been established that Jimmy Savile’s abuses had been known about at the BBC, but the producers of the Jim’ll Fix It knew of his transgressions and never sought to do anything, for the sake of the show, denying all allegations that they would have known a thing. Their guilt supressed or justified the acts in their mind and it was due to the fact that the show had such success, they did not want to lose the profits or for the entertainment or even education of the children.
The example in the previous paragraph is a clever way society has found to justify criminal behaviour, which otherwise would be punishable in the eyes of the law and it is very commonly used by any military or peace enforcement organisation which uses any type of gun. “Killing some for the sake of many” or “I killed or tortured “X” (where X is a terrorist, by today’s standards) to avoid a future catastrophe”. – These are some of the examples of suppression or justification of Guilt, which do not make the action any less inhumane.
To conclude, I can only hope that this essay would have provided you, the reader with broader view on the feeling of guilt, why some people commit crime out of feeling of guilt and why some people lack the feeling of guilt.
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basic human relationships, attachments and boundaries are developed. Guilt, according to Freud, is the basic struggle between the Super-Ego (Societal input, which comes from the parents) and the Ego (Personal limitations of the Id that come from observance). The Id, if left without any input from the Ego or the Super-Ego, does not develop in the same way for every individual and therefore it is possible that certain feelings not be developed at all, especially the ones that relate to boundaries, like Guilt or Fear.
Freud also talks about two theories for the origin of Guilt, two primordial origins: the first is the Oedipal Syndrome, based on the Greek Tragedy of Oedipus or the theory of the Primal Horde, in which the sons kill the father in order to possess the women, but in suddenly realising their mistake, they create boundaries for themselves.
In this essay, by using the example of Dostoevsky, seen through Freud’s eyes, I took to a personal reflection of a case study, to establish that guilt does indeed lead to criminal behaviour.
To conclude my essay, I also took the case of Jimmy Savile, a renowned entertainer, paedophile, necrophile and neurotic to establish the presence of Guilt in his behaviour and my findings were that whilst he had once known guilt, which came with punishment from an external source – his mother, a guilt he had internalised and used against any person who would fit his “desires”, after the mother’s death, he completely removes guilt from his feelings and instead, adopts a delusional feeling of invulnerability – power for the sake of power, which also comes from the overcompensation he feels he must make for the years when he felt completely powerless.
Bibliography
1. “Dostoevsky and Parricide”, Sigmund Freud, 1928
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3. https://www.channel4.com/news/how-jimmy-savile-revealed-all-in-the-psychiatrists-chair, Last accessed 10 January 2017.
4. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jun/26/jimmy-savile-sexual-abuse-timeline: ”Jimmy Savile: timeline of his sexual abuse and its uncovering”, written by Josh Halliday, 26 June 2014. Last accessed 10 January 2017
5. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jun/26/savile-bodies-sex-acts-corpses-glass-eyes-mortuary. Written by Josh Halliday, 26 June 2014. Last accessed 10 January 2017
