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MANY ATTACKS and criticisms have been levelled at psychoanalysis, some of them mutually contradictory: It is a "religion"; it is antireligious; it is a self-indulgent pastime for rich evaders of responsibility; it is ineffectual as therapy; psychoanalysis is for intellectuals; psychoanalysis is not scientific; because of the time and money required to become an analyst, the practice of psychoanalysis is restricted to a sociologic elite; because of the time and money which the patients invest, the practice of psychoanalysis is lucrative. (17), (19)
From this melange of attack and criticism, I shall address myself at this time to the issue of psychoanalysis for an elite of patients and an elite of practitioners.
At times it is difficult to ascertain whether the target of these attacks is essentially Freudian psychoanalysis, or also its revisionist modifications and expansions, or simply psychotherapy per se (excluding, of course, operant conditioning!) One also needs to disentangle the criticisms arising from those desirous of somehow extending the benefit of psychoanalysis to a wider economic and sociologic range of persons from the attacks by those who simply think no version of the method is, at best, of any use. Though I speak of attacks on the American scene, I imagine they are not unknown to our colleagues from other countries.
Having given the criticisms in headline, so to speak, I hasten to state that, though the notion of psychoanalysis for an elite has been voiced negatively, both by outsiders and by persons in the field, it has also been asserted by some of our colleagues either as a matter of fact or as a matter of pride.