Menninger, Karl

In 1968, Karl Menninger, the undisputed leader of postwar American psychiatry, defined mental illness as a certain state of existence which is uncom-... 

Menninger offers the same explanation for masturbation ".. . in the unconscious mind it [masturbation] always represents an aggression against some one. (Karl Menninger, Man Against Himself, p. 69.) For further discussion, see Chapter 11. 

It is clear that psychiatrists have a vested interest in diagnosing as mentally ill as many people as possible, just as inquisitors had in branding them as heretics. The conscientious psychiatrist authenticates himself as a competent medical man by holding that sexual deviants (and all kinds of other people, perhaps all of mankind, as Karl Menninger would have it) are mentally ill, just as the "conscientious inquisitor authenticated himself as a faithful Christian by holding that homosexuals (and all kinds of other people) were heretics. We must realize that in situations of this kind we are confronted, not with scientific problems to be solved, but with social roles to be confirmed. Inquisitor and witch, psychiatrist and mental patient, create each other and authenticate each other s... 

Thus, Karl Menninger, perhaps the most influential contemporary psychoanalyst, sees in masturbation aggression against others and oneself. Closely related to the exhibitionistic motive in suicide is its connection with masturbation, he writes in 1938. It has been observed that suicidal attempts sometimes follow the interruption of an individual s habitual autoerotic activities. This interruption may... 

The American Orthopsychiatric Association is formed. The organization is initiated by Karl Menninger, who sends a letter to twenty-six leading American psychiatrists urging them to form a new group of representatives of the neuropsychiatric or medical view of crime. ... 

Karl Menninger publishes The Human Mind .. . what science or scientist is interested in justice Is pneumonia Just ... 

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