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The word “Masochism” has become a descriptive label for any behavior that seems to defy the pleasure principle and have physical or psychic pain as its goal. Freud, seeking to escape from the dilemma of either surrendering the pleasure principle or leaving such wayward behavior essentially unexplained, stepped beyond the pleasure principle into the death instinct hypothesis. This moved the explanation of masochism into the transcendental frying pan. Nonetheless, in Beyond the Pleasure Principle, he made us share his perception that in some behavior the repetition of past imprint appears to be a primary determinant in the unreasoning bizarre pattern and that new gratification can only be secondary. We now admit a discernible repetition compulsion even if we do not accepzt the hypothesis that death is its goal.
To escape the metaphoric trap of Freud's “death instinct,” as an explanation and yet tell things as they are, Esther Menaker pointed out (in 1953) with new clarity, that the stake in the masochistic game might be survival, not pleasure or death.7 The model she constructed made a connection between bizarre human behavior and animal behavior. She focussed on the “self preservation of the ego” as the motive behind masochistic behavior.†