The depersonalized neurotic labors under the following conflict: an anal-exhibitionistic repressed wish is warded off with pleasurable self-voyeurism; that defense is in turn prohibited by the superego and a secondary unconscious defense is installed: 'I don't peep at myself, I just mournfully observe my sickness'. The constant self-observation, which is an integral part of the condition, is concerned with beating fantasies. Depersonalization seems to represent one of the many possible—though typical—attenuated end results of the 'a child is being beaten' fantasy executed by means of scoptophilia. The buttocks in these fantasies represent breasts.