Psychodynamic View of Sadism

Freud (1908) spoke of the innate connection between sex and aggression in sadistic acts. His psychosexual developmental stages included an oral erotic stage (sucking) and an oral sadistic stage (biting) in early infancy. He thought that the genesis of sadism lies in a fixation at the oral-sadistic stage, a view that he questioned later in his life (Freud, 1932). Freud (1908) also posited a connection between sadism and sex: children

adopt what may be called a sadistic view of coition. They see there is something that the stronger participant is forcibly inflicting on the weaker, and they (especially boys) compare it to the romping familiar to them from their childish experience—romping which, incidentally, is not without a dash of sexual excitation. ... They have interpreted the act of love as an act of violence,... [in other words] a sadistic theory of coitus, (pp. 220-221)

In StekeTs (1953) text Sadism and Masochism, considered by many to be a classic, he elaborated on the psychoanalytic view of sadism and described 64 cases involving various forms of sadistic and sadomasochistic behaviors. He also concluded, as did Freud, that sadomasochism is a disturbance in the psychosexual development of the individual. Sadistic persons have a “retrospective” orientation: they relive certain conflict situations in their early lives by the use of symbols, projections, condensations, and role exchanges. But other psychoanalysts do not view sadism in these relatively straightforward terms; in fact, Hinsie and Campbell (1970) list nine different types of sadism, each with a slightly different psychodynamic etiology.

Fenichel (1945) provided perhaps the clearest psychoanalytic theory of the genesis of sadism. He viewed sadistic behavior as a reassurance against anxiety connected with the fear of castration. According to this view, sadism develops in several stages: (1) the individual derives a feeling of power from acts of cruelty, (2) he achieves sexual satisfaction from torturing other persons, and (3) feelings of power and satisfaction lead to a sense of security because the individual is able to inflict on others that which he would not like inflicted on himself. Thus, acts of self-protection become aggressive and eroticized.

The psychoanalytic view of the role of “the castration complex” in the genesis of sadism is illustrated by the case of Joseph Kallinger, reported by Arieti and Schreiber (1981) and Schreiber (1984). Adopted when he was 2Vi years old, the offender was raised by parents who used corporal punishment, threatened to send him back to the orphanage for alleged disobedience, burned his fingers over a stove, isolated him from other children in preadolescence, did not allow him to go on class trips, and forced him to work long hours in his father’s shoe-repair shop. The authors noted a pivotal experience in the offender’s young life. When he was 6 years old, he had to have surgery. Prior to the hospitalization, the parents warned their young son that the doctor would use a knife to remove the devil living in his penis; his penis would therefore remain small, and he would never get into trouble because the devil does not stay in small penises.

As a preadolescent, Kallinger threatened a boy with a knife, ordered him to undress, and then attacked him. As an adult, he had to hold a knife during sexual relations in order to obtain an erection and ejaculation. He once burned his daughter’s leg close to her genitals, rationalizing that she deserved it as punishment. The offender later killed two boys and then went on a spree of burglaries with one of his sons. Finally, before apprehension, Kallinger tied up seven people with the help of his son and ordered a woman to chew off the penis of a male victim. When she refused, he brutally killed her.

Fenichel’s view that sadism is based on fear of castration seems obvious in this case. Fenichel (1945) stated,

If a person is able to do to others what he fears may be done to him, he no longer has to be afraid. Thus, anything that tends to increase the subject’s power or prestige can be used as a reassurance against anxieties. What might happen to the subject passively is done actively by him in anticipation of attack. ... The idea “before I can enjoy sexuality,

I must convince myself that I am powerful” is, to be sure, not identical with “I get sexual pleasure through torturing other persons”; however, it is the starting point for sadistic development, (p. 354)

Not only does the Kallinger case illustrate the relationship between sadism and fear of castration, but it also illuminates the development of sadism from the stage of power and dominance to the eventual erotization of a destructive compulsion.