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8/16/2019 Benjamin Master and Slave
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1 H
ONDS or LOVE
50
tio n in internal
rhythms;
later,
there is alternation between the
oneness
of
harmonious attunement and the
two-ness
of
disengage ment.
But
why has the
dualistic
view of
the
individual
enjoyed plausibil
i
ty
for so long
l
Why docs the
idea of
the
linear movemen
t
toward
separation, of the constructio n of the psyche in terms of the internali
zation of
objects
ring
so true?
Perhaps
it
is
because this
conception
of
the individual
re
ects a
powerful experience
- wh ose
origins
w e have
discov
ered in the rapproc
hem
e
nt conflict-the
experience o f paradox
as
painful,
or
e :,en
intolerable. Perhaps, also, because
of
a
c o ~ t i n u n g
fear
that dependency on the other
is a
threat to independence,
that
recognition
of the other
compromises
the self. When the conflict
between dependence and independence becomes too intense, the psyche
giv es up the
paradox
in favor of an opposition.
Polarity,
the conflict
opposit
es, replaces the balance
within the
self.
This
polarity sets the
stage for defining
the
self in terms of a movement away
from
depen
dency.
It also
sets
the stage for dominatiC'n.
Opposites
can no longer be
in t
egrated; one side
is
devalued. the
other
id ealized (splittmg). In
th i
s
chapt
er we
have concentrated on infancy,
on the shifts in the
balance of assertion and
recognition
at the earliest
moment
s in the
self-other
relationship.
We have
seen
how
a crisis arises
as differ
entia
tion proceeds and recognition of
otherness
co n fron ts the self with
a
momentous paradox.
In
the following chapter
s
we
shall analyze
how
this inability
to
sustain
the
tension
of paradox manifest
s
itself in
all
forms of
domination,
and
why
this occurs.
W e shall begin by
following the
breakdo wn
of
tension
into
its
adult
for m . erotic
domination
and submission.
/t ;
,:>/),J
{n I
H
P T E I
T
o
_a s t e r
and
S l
ave
I N TH E P O S T f R E U
DIA
N
w
orld
it
is commnn
place to assum e that
the foundati ons
of ero tic l
if
e lie in
infancy.
This
means
that
adult sexu al love is n
ot
on h'
s
haped
by the t'vents
datin
g fro m th
at
p
er
iod o f in tense
intima
cy and
dependency,
it also an o
pp
o
rtun
i
ty
to
reenact and
work
out
the co nflicts that
bega
n there.
Wher
e
the
site of
control
and
aband on
is [h
('
b
od r.
the
demands of
the infa
nt
se
lf
arc
mo
st v i
si
b
le and
so
rh,
s
hift
from differe
nt
i
ation
to
domi
na
tion.
In sadNnaso-
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I H 12
B ONOS OF
LOVE
52
chisric fantasies and relationships we can discern the pure culture of
domination a
dynamic which
organizes both
domination
and sub
mission.
The fantasy
of
erotic domlllation embodies both the desire for
independence and
the desire for r
ecognition
.
This inquiry
int
ends to
ullderstand the process of alienation
whereb
y these desires are
trans
formed into erotic
violence
and submission.
What we
shall see, esp e
cially
in
voluntary
submissioil to erotic domination,
is
a
paradox
in
which the individual tries achieve freedom
through
slavery,
r ~ l e s
through submission to control.
Once
we understand submission to be
the T '
of
the
dominated as
well
as their
helpless fate,
we may hope
to answer
the central
qu
es tion, How
is
domination anchored in the
hear tS
of
those
who subm
it
to
it t
DOMIN TION
ND
DIFFERENTI TION
Domination begins with the attempt to deny dependency . No
one
can
-truly extricate
himself from dependency on
others,
from the
need for
recognition
. In the first relationship
of
dependency,
between child and
parent , this
is
an especially painful and paradoxical lesson. A child must
come to
terms
with the fact
that he docs not magicall y
control
the
mother, and that
what
she d o
cs
for
him
is subject to her,
not
his,
will.
The paradox is that the child
not only nee
ds
to achieve
independence,
but he must be recognized
as
independent-by the very
people
on
whom
he has been
most
de
pendent
.
As we
have seen in
chapt
er
1, much
can
go
amiss at this
point.
If,
for example, the child
is
unable to relinquish the fantasy of
omnipo
tence, he may be tempted
t
believe
that he
can
become
independent
without recognizing the other person. ( 1 will continue to beli eve that
mother
is
my
servant,
a genie
who
fulfIlls my wishes
and does as
I
command, an extension of my will ). The child may be tempted to
believe
that
the other person
is not
separate. (
She belongs to me,
I
control and possess her. ) In short, he fails to confront his own
dependency on
someone
outside himself. Alternativel y, the
child
may
53
t e r an d SI ave
continue to
see
the mother
as all-po we
rful, and
him se
lf
as hel pless.
In
this case, the apparent
accept
a
nce
of
dependency
masks th e
cRo rt
to
retain
control by
remai ning connected to the m o ther ( I am good a nd
powerful
because I
am exactly
like my
good
and po werfu l m
other
wishes me to
be ). This
child d oes
not believ
e he will
ever
?;ain
rec
ognition for
his o
wn indep
e
ndent
se lf.
and
so he de
DI CS
th,lt sel
f.
In my discussion
of infancy
, I have already demonsrratl,d th at the
balance
ulirhin the
self
depends upon
mutual rec o
gniti
on /11'(1/1('( 1/ sci
and other. And mutual
recognition
is
perhaps
the
v
ul
ne ra ble
point in the
proce
ss of differentiatio
n. In
He g el's not ion ()f rccl)g ni
tion, the
self
requires
the
opportuniry to act
and
have
m
effcct
on
t
h·
'
other
to affirm his existence.
In
order to ex ist for oneself.
nne
has to
exist for an o ther. It w ould seem there is
110
way
out
of this depen
dency. If I destroy the other, there is no o lle
to
recogDl7c Ill e. fo r it
I allow
him
no
ind
e
pendent
consciousne
ss
, I b
ec
ome cn
l1l
es
h
eJ
WIth
a dead,
not-conscious
being .
If th
e other
denie
s
me
re
cogniti
o n. my
acts have
no meaning;
if he is so far
ab
ove me
that
nN h i
ng
I do C1n
alter his attitude tow ard me, 1 can only submit.
My
des ire and age ncy
can fmd
no outlet,
except in
the
form of
obedience.
We
might call this the dialectic of
control
: If I co mp ler 'ly w nt ro l
the other, then the other ceases to exist,
and
if
the
other
com
ple tely
controls
me, then
I cease to exist. A
conditi
on
of
our
own
indcpen Jenl
existence is recognizing the
other.
Tru e independe nce means sllsraifli np
the essential
tension
of these
contradictory
impulses;
that
is. bot t
asserting
the self and recognizing the
o ther. D o
mination
is
the cons
e·
quence of refusing this condition.
In
mutual
recognition
the subject
accepts the premise
that Nh
c
rs an
separate
but
nonetheless share
like fe
elings and
intention
s. T he subje c
is
compensated for his loss of s
over
e ignty by the pleas ure of shar ing
the communion
with
another
~ i e c
But
for
H egel ,
:I S for
Fr
eu
d, tht
breakdown of
essential tension is inevitable . T he hypothetical scI
presented by Hegel
and
Freud does not l l t to reco gn ize the oche
does
not perceive
him
as
a person
ju
st
like himse
lf. He gives ul
omnipotence
only w hen he has no o ther cho ice. H
is
ee for eh
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TH
B
ON D
S
OF
LO VE
S4
o ther in Freud, physiological, in Hegel, existential-seems to place
him in
the
other
's
power,
as if dependency were
the equivalent of
surrender. When the subject abandons the project of absolute indepen
de nce or control, he docs so unwillingly, with a persistent,
if
uncon
scio
us , wish to fulfill the old
omnipotence
fantasy.
This is
a far
cry
from
actually appreciating the other as a
being
in his or her own right.
Since the subject cannot accept his dependency
on
someone
he
cannot contro l, the solution is
to
subjugate and enslave the other- to
make him give that recognition v ~ . i re
cognizing him
in re
turn.
The
primary
consequence of t he mabili ty to reconcile de
pendence
wi th
independence, then, is the transforma
ti
o n of
ne
ed for the other into
domination
of
him.
For Freud and He g
el
this is precisely what happ
en
s in the
st
ate of
nature. " In Freud's terms, aggression and th e des ire for mastery
nec
es
sary
derivativ
es
of
the death instinct
a
re
part
of
our
natur
e.
Without
the restraint of civilization , whoever is more powerful will
subjugate
the
other
.
The
wish to restore ea rly omnipotence,
or to
realize the fantasy of
control,
never cea
se
s to motivate the
individual.
In H egel's terms, self-conscio usness wants
to
be absolute.
It
wants to
be r e
cognized by
the other in order to place itself
in
the
world and
make itself the whole world. The I wants to prove itself at the expense
of
the
other; it wants
to think
itself the
only
one; it abjures
depen
dency.
Since ea ch se
lf
raises the same claim, the two must
struggle
to
the death
for
recognition. For Hegel this struggle does no t culminate
in
the
survival
of
each for
th
e other, in mutual
recognition. Rather,
the stron ger makes the other his slave.
But this viewpoint
would
imply that submission is simply th e
hard
lot of the weak.
And indeed, the qu estion of why the oppressed
submit is
never fully
explain
ed.
Yet
the ques
tion of
submission
is
implicitly
raised
by
Hegel
and
Freud,
who see
that
the
slave
must grant
power of recognition to the master. To understand this side of the
relationship of domination, we must turn to an
account written
from
the point of view of one who submi ts .
55 M a
>H
T
:11\(1 ::: 1 :I C
THE F
NT SY OF EROT
IC DOM I
N T
I
ON
Sadomasochistic fantasy , the m ost
comm
on fo rm of cr\ltic
dl1mination,
replicates
quit
e
faithfully
the them
es of
the ma
st
er-sla
ve
rcl.lt
ionship
.
H e re
subjugation
takes the fo rm
of
transg ress i
ng
aga
ll1
t the
0t
h cr 's
body,
violating hi
s
ph
ysical
bound
ari es .
The
ct of vio lan on
of
t
he
body becomes a way
of
representing the struggle to th, death for
recog nition.
Ri tua
l vio lat ion is a form uf risk ing the p
wch
n]ogi ca l.
if
not the
phy
sical, self.
I have based my anal ysis of sadomasoch istic fantasy (In a sing le.
powerful
s
tudy of
the
erotic imagination
, Pauline
Rb gc\ ·{(If), O.
Reage \ talc is a
web in
which the is
su
es of de pendency and
dn
l1lin:u inl1
are incxtriC:lbly intertwined, in which the
co
nAic[ betw (,(ol rh e
for autonomy
and
the desire fo r
can on ly be v e d
by
total nonunciation of self. It illustrates pow er fu lly the princ iple that
the
root of dom mation
lies in the brea
kd
ow n
of
tension
betwe
en
~ ( H
and other.
Perhaps the greatest
objection to
this w or k
by
fem inish has be
er
direct ed against its depiction of O 's
voluntar
y submissiono For th em
the account
of
O's masochi sm is no t an ::d legor y o f the desire f Oi
re
cognition,
but simply the s
tory
of a v ict imized w om:11l . to o wea1
or brainwashed or hopeless to resist her degradatio n.'
Such
a vie\'\rpo in
cannot, of cour
se
, e
xplain
\ v hat
sa
t
isfl.
c
tion
is
soug
ht and
foun
d
il
submission, what psy
cholo
gical mo
ti
vations lead to
op
pressi
0n.
humJi
iation, and
subservi
ence. It deni es the
unp
leasant
[
act
that people rcal l'
do
c
on
sent
to relationships of domin
a
tion,
and
that
fa
nt
asies of
domi
nation
play a v
igo
rous
part
in the m
ent
al lives of ma ny
wh0 do
nc
actually
do
so.
tory
of
0 confronts
us
bo ldl y with the idea that people oftt'
submit no t mer ely out of fear, but in co mp li city Wi th their ow
deepest desires.
Told from
the PO
lDt of
view of the W
0m
an wh
submits, and representing,
as
it docs, (he fan tasy life o f a gi fted
woma
wr iter,4 the
sto
ry
compels
the rcade r
t
accept the auth
enticity
elf lh
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i
T HE B
ONOS OF
I OVr
S6
de si
re
for submIss ion.
But
the
narrative
also
makes
clear
that
the desire
fo r submission represents a peculiar transposition of the de S re for
recognition . O's physical humiliati on and abu se represent a search for
an elusive
sp
iritual or psychol()gica l satisfaction. Her
maso
chism is a
se
ar ch for recognition
throu
gh an other who is powerful
enough
to
b estoW thi s recog niti on. This other has the power for which the self
lo
ngs,
and through his recognition she gains it, though vicariously.
At
th e beginning of
tory o
OJ the
heroine
is, without w arning,
brough
t by her lover to Roissy Castl e, an estab lishment organized by
m en for the ritua l violation and
s u ~ j l 1 g a t i
of women. There she is
g iv n spcci
fic in
structions :
Y o u arc here to serve
your
masters
At the first word
or
sign
fr
om
anyone YO ll will
drop
wh atever
you
arc
doin
g
and
ready
o
ur
s
el
f
for
what
is
really
your
one
and only
duty:
to
lend
yo
urs
elf Your
hands are not your own,
nor
arc yo ur breasts, no r
m ost especially , any
of your
orifices, wh ich we m ay
explore
or
penetr:lte at w ill. You hav e lost all rig ht to pri vacy or
concealment you
n1
1)st
never l
ook
any
of
us in
the
face.
If
th e cos tum e w e we ar leaves our sex exposed, it is not for
th e sake
of
convenielY t· but for the
sa
ke
of
ins
olenc
e, so your
eyes
will be directed there
upon
it and nowhere el
se
so that you
may learn that there resid( ,o your maste r. [Your] being
w
hip
ped . is less for our pleasure than for your enlightenment.
Both
this floggi ng an d the chain
attached
to
th e
ring
of
yo
ur
collar . are intended less to make you suffer, scream or shed
tears than to make yo u feel, through this suf ferin g, that you are
n ot
free
but
fettered, and
to
teach
you
that
you ar
e
totally
dedicated to som ething o
ut
si
de yo urse lf.>
A g reat de al is contained in these several lines. First, 0 is to lose all
subjectivity, all
po
ssibility of us
ing
her body
for
action; she is to be
mer el y a th ing. Second, s
he
is to
be
continually
violated, even when
57
J\1:lQl'r an d
SI:w,
she is not actuall y
bein
g used. T
he
ma in transg ression o f hl'f
hll l i l ld
3rie
consists o f her hav in g to he alway\ ;
waihbk
and
0pcn
. ' I
hHll.
he
masters are to be rec
og
nized
by
her In an ind irec t 'u
rll1
.
r he
pel1l
represents their desire, and through thi s i
ndi
recr l · l l l < 1 t i \ l l 1
the::
will
maint
ain th e
ir sov
ereignty . Bv
interposin
g it bel \\'l'Cn h
er
anc
them th ey establish a subjectivity that
is
dis
tan
ced, inde pen dcnt
( If hl
r
ecogni tion.
Ind eed ,
th
ey claim tha t their ab u \e
of
h
lT
i,
ll1()
rc he
"en li g
ht
enment" than their pleas
ur l·.
so rh:H ev en in hn tlll 'V d(
no t a pp e:J r
to
need her. Th eir acts a rC carefull y contw lkll: l"ICh Jet h;l
a goal that expresses th eir rational in ten tions. Thei r sad l\[I(' rlca
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- H E BONDS OF LO V I
58
resistance to be ll1 g absorbed by
th
e
thing
he is controlling: howe ver
interdependent the master and slave
may
become, the difference be
tween them w ill be sustained.
The story
is driven forward by the dialectIC of
contro '
Since a slave
who is completely dominated lo
ses th
e guality
of
being able to give
recognition, the struggle
to
possess her
ITlUst
be prolonged. 0 must be
enslaved
pi
ece by piece;
new
levels of resistance must be found, so that
she can b e vanquished
anew
-·- She
must
acquiesce in ever deeper
humiliation, pain, and bondage, and she must will her submission ever
aneW, each time her masters
ask
her,
0,
do you cnn
se
nt?"
The
narrat ive moves
throu
gh these ever deeper levels
of
submission , tracing
the impact of each fresh nega tion
of
her will, each n
ew def
eat of her
re >iscance.
The
culmination
of th e dialectic,
th
e point when has submitted
a
nd
R ene, her love r, has
ex
hausted
the
possibil it ies o f
violating
her,
wo uld, l
og
ically , pr esent a narrative problem.
But before
the problem
can arise, before Rene becomes
bored with 0
s submission and she
is
used IIp and discarded, a new source of tension
is
introduced. One day
Re ne pr esen ts to Sir Stephen, hi s older (a nd more powerful) step
brother, to whom she is
to
be "given." Unlike R ene, Sir
Stephen
does
not
love O. H e is desc ribed as having a "will of icc and iron, which
would not be svvayed b y desire,"
and he demand
s that she obey him
without loving him, and without his loving her.
6
Yet this more
complete surrender of
her
person and acceptance of
her
object status
further arouses O 's desire,
makes
her
wish
to
matter
in some
way,
to
"exist for him." Sir
Stephen
fmds new ways of intensifying O's
bondage: he employs her to entice
another
woman; he sends
her to
another castle , Samois, where
will
abuse and be abused by other
wo
men; and he makes her "more in te
resting"
by having her
brand
ed
and her anlls enlarged. These
measures
make Sit Steph
en's form
of
mastery even more rational, c;alculating, and self-controlled than
Rents mo re fully independent
of
his slave.
Furth ermo re, the fact that Rene lo
oks up
to Sir Stephen as
to
a
father sug gests that he
is
the loved
authority
not only for 0, but al so
59
taslc r and
SI;,,;('
fo r R ene .
He is
the per son in v.r
ho
se eyes Rene wa nt s to be rccngn izcd;
g iving Sir
Stephm
his love r is a form of "o beisance." an d Re n e is
obvil·usly "pleased that [Si r Stephen] deigned to u k e : l ~ u
ill
something he had given him." Ind eeel, 0 realizes h ~ t th
L
t \ \ . (1 m en
share so
mething
"mysterio us .
more acute, m o re in tens e than amt'l
ro u
s communion"
from
which she is excl ud ed, ev en ,he
i-;
the
m edium for it. R ene's de l1 v cry of 0 to Si r St
ep
hen 1- a way
of
surrendering himself
sexually
to the mo re pow e rful m an.
"Wh:lt each
of
them would look for in her
would be
the o
ther'
s m ark. the
tr
ace
of the other's passage." Indeed, for R ene . Sir Ste phe n s s C s ~ i ot
o sanctifJes her, leaving " th e mark o f a go
d."
7
R ene's relati onsh ip with Sir Stephen calls fo r a rc in rcrpH'rarinn
( If
the
story
up
to
this po int: v now that
the ol-:j
cctiflcnioll
of
the
wo
man is inspired bo th by the need to :1ssc rr d iffere nce fro m her ,
;l
nd
by th e des
ire to
gain pre
stige
in the father·s eye
s.
T
hu
s R ene
b L g i n ~
to relinquish his love for 0, the tender
and
co mp assio nate idl,nt i fi ca
tion that moved him
wh
en she fmt surrendered, ro r the sake hi
identifIcation
and alliance with the
father.
W e mtght say
th
at rhe d esi re
for recog ni tio n by the father wholly overtakes the love of the mo the
it
b
eco
mes another moti ve for
domination.
(T his shift in al leg i
an
ce
shows how the roo ts of do mination li e not on ly in th e n : ( ~ c
drama
of moth er and
child, but al
so in the ()ed ipal
tri;1
d. :l S chaptc1
4 will discu ss in detail) .
O '
s unimportance to
eithe
r m an by compJ.ri.
so n with their bond to eac h other be comes a furt her :lSpcct
(If
h
el
humiliati
on and negatio n.
D
espi t
e the narrative's attempt
to
create mo
re
dram
atic
tension. thl
story eventually
becom
es heavy with O's inexo rab le loss of subJc
ct
iv.
ity. Pla ying the complementary part to her masters,
0
re linquishes al
sense of difference and separateness in o rde r to remain
t ;d l c
osts-
co nnected to them . O's deep
es
t fears of abandon ment and scpararl0J
emerge as h er tie to Rene is gra dually dissolved by her bondage c(
Sir Stephen . Briefly left al one , she b
eg
ins to bel icv" she has lost Rene'
l
ove;
she fee
ls
that her
li
fe is abst,l u tely
void.
She th inks ,
paraphras
in
a Protest ant
text
she had seen as a
child,
"It is a fearful thing to b
http:///reader/full/compJ.rihttp:///reader/full/compJ.ri
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Tf lE
BOND
S
OF l OV
E
GO
cast out
of
the hands of the living God." 0 is the los t soul who can
only be restored to grace by putting herself in th e hands of th e ideal,
omnipotent other.
As
th
e story
continu
es, 0 's des ire fo r connection increasin gly as
su
me
s the symbolic and ritllal character of a
devoti
on: now it is her
task
to
live according to her new l
ove
r's will,
to
serve him whether
he
is
prese
nt
or
not.
H er lover
is
lik e a go d, -a
nd
her need
for him ca
n
o nly be sa tisfIed by o bedience, which
allows
her to transcend her
se
lf
by becoming an instrument
of
his supreme will. In this way, O's Story,
with its th emes of de
vo
tion and transcendence, is sugges tiv e of the
surrender of
the saints. T he
tortur
e and outrage to which she submi ts
is
a kind of martyrdom, seeming "to her the very redemption
of
her
sins."8 O's gre at longing
is
to be knol/JIl
and
in this respect she
is
lik e
an v lover, for the secret of love is to be known
as
one self. But her
to be kn
ow
n is like
that
of
the
sinner
who
wants
to
be
known
by God. Sir Stephen thrills her because he know s her instantly; he
knows
her to
be
bad, wanton, reveling in her debasement.
Ho w
ever,
this
knowin
g can only go so far, becaus e there
is
progressivel y less of
o th e subject left to be known.
tory 0 concl udcs with a note that proposes tw o possible endin gs
to the story . In the flfSt, Sir Stephen returns 0 t R oissy and abandons
her there. In the second, 0 "seein g that
Sir
Ste
phen
was
about
to lea ve
her, said she vvo uld prefe r to die. Sir Stephen gave her his consent."
This is her fmal ges ture of hero ism, her l
as
t opportunity to expre
ss
her
lover's will.
The
gesture
is
in keeping
with O's
paradoxical
hop
e
that
in
complete
surrender she
will
fmd her elusive sel
f.
For this hop e
is
th e other side
of
O's devotional servitude: in perfor ming the tasks her
masters se t her, 0 seeks affirmati on of herself. 0 is actually willing
to risk compl ete annihilation of her person in o rder
to
continue to be
the obj
ec
t
of
her lover's desire
- tO
be
recognized.
O's
fear of loss and
abandonment
points to an
important
aspect of
the
que
sti
on
of
pain
. The problem
of
masochism has been
oversimpli
fIed
ever since Freud's paradoxical assertion th at the m
as
ochist takes
pleasure in pain.
9
But current
psychoanalytic theory appreciates that
61
\ : J ~ ( ( ~ amI
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62
HE
BO N
DS O F LOVE
The
r
el
a
tionship
of
domination
is asymmetrica
l. It
can be reverse d,
as '\l\Then 0
tak
es on th e
role
of tortur e
r, but
it can nev er become
recip r ocal or equal. Id entification plays an important part in this
reversibl
e relationship, but always with the s
tipulation that
th e maso
chist gains h
er
ide
ntity
th ro ugh the master' s power, even
as
he
actively
negates
his
identity
with
her.
Inflicting pain is
the ma
ste
r'
s
way
of
maintai ning his separa te identity. In her pain, O's body moves her
master
s, but
ch
ie fl
y because it displays the
marks they
hav e l
ef
t.
Of
course,
th
eir em o
tion is a
lwa
ys checked, and is finall y
diminished
as
she becomes
increasingly a dehumanized object,
as
her
thing-like
natur
e makes her pain mute. N one theless, her submission to their
will
embodies
th
e
ultimat
e r
ecogn
ition
of their power. Submission becomes
the pu re
form
of
r
ecog nition,
even
as violation
bec
omes
the pure
form of assertion. The assertion of one individual (the mas te r) is
transf
orm
ed
in to domination; the o
th
er's (the slave's) recog
niti
on
becomes submission. Th us the basic tens ion of forces within the indi
vid
ual
beco mes a dynamic h( twfm indi vid uals.
DOMTNATION , DEATH AND DISCONTENT
Th
e relationship
of
domination is fueled by th e sam e d
es
ire fo r recog
nition
t
hat
w e find in love-
but wh
y does it takes this form? E ven
if we accept th at 0 is seekin g recogniti o n, we still want to know why
her
search
culminates
in s
ubm
iss
ion , instead
of
in a relati
onship
o f
mutuality.
Why
this com
plem
e
nt
ar
ity
bet
wee
n the a
ll-po
werful
and
the p0werless instead of the eq ual power of tw o subj ects?
W e already have some sen
se of
h
ow Freud
and H egel ha
ve
ap
proach
ed these questions.
Their
answer
s,
as
1 have
pointed o
ut,
ass
um
e
the
inevit
able
human
a.
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TH
E
ONOS OF LO
V E 64
c
ro[j
cism; and
it JSSUl11es
its starkest expression in
erotic violation.
It
sh o
u ld be no ted, h
ow
ever , that the break must
never
really diss01 ve the
b
oun
da.r i
es
- else de:lth results.
Ex
citement resides in
th
e
risk of death
,
no r
in death
it
se
lf.
And
it
is erot
ic
complementarity that offers
a wa y
to
sim ul tan co usly br ea.k
through
and
pr
eserve the boundaries: in
the
opp
o
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T H S O N
DS
or LOVE
66
a relationship is initi ated in o rder to reintrod uce te
ns
ion- to co
un
tc ract
numbn
ess with pain,
to brea
k enca sement th
ro
ugh vi o lation.
Batail1c imp lies that
we
need
th
e spilt unity of master and slave in
order to
maintain
the: boundaries that erotic
union
- the " little death
of
the self- threate ns to disso lv
e.
But ,
as
we see, split unity c
ulmin
ates
in dis
connec t ion.
The
ex haus tion
of sa
ti
sfaction that occurs
whe
n all
resistance is v anquished, all tension
is
lost, means
that the
relati ons hip
has come full circle, returned to th e e
mptiness from
which it was an
effor t to escape.
But why is loss of tensio n the beg
innin
g and inevi table e
nd
of this
story?
Freud's theory of the instincts offers us
one
ln terpretation.
Indeed, hi s whole ex planation of th e d iscontents of civ ilization hinges
on hi s interpreta ti on of loss of tension. 19
Freud
beli eve d that onl y th e
i
de
a o f a
de
ath drive that impels
us
toward complete abse nce
of
tension
could
explain the prevalence of destruction and aggression in human
l ife. Pr
Oje
c
ting
the death drive outwa
rd
in the
form
o f aggression or
maste ry was our main
prot
ec tion against succumbi ng
to
it. H ere, as
I sec it,
is
F re
ud'
s eff,·r t to explain domination, his parall el to the
master-sla ve paradox.
D
omi nation
, for Fr
eud
, is inevitable
si
nce o the
rwi
se th e
death in
stinct, that primary driv e toward not
hin
gness (complete loss of ten
sion), would
turn
inwa rd and destroy
li f
e itself. But fo
rtunatel
y
agg r ession mu st contend w ith its
immortal adve
rs ary, the li fe
in
stinct, Er os. Eros. in general, and sexua
lity,
in particul ar,
neutralize
or
bind
aggress i
on.
Freud
writes
th
at the
li f
e and
death
instin cts
almost
never
appear in isolation, but "arc alloyed with each o th er . .. and
so beco me Th e best place to observe and analyze thi s
merger is
ernti c li fe: sadism and masochism are manifestations of the
d
es tructive
instin
ct
.. . stron gly a
lloye
d with er
ot
ism. "20 Indeed, ero tic
do
m ination,
Fr
eud contin
ll
es, may be the prime place to app rehe
nd
the
alliance of Iros and the dea th instinc t:
It
is
in sadism , where
the
death instinct twists the ero tic aim in
its
ow
n se nse, and ye t at
th
e
sa
me time fully
sa
tis
fJ
es th e erotic
67
Ma\tl'r
;m.t
s13\ c
urg
t"
that w e succeed in o
bt
aining th e ins ight ill tt l ll .
nature, and its rel ati o n to F ros. But cven w here it m r ~ s
without an y sex ual
purp
ose, in the blin dest C
ur
y o f destructive
ness, we c
anno
t fa
il
to recogn ize that the sati sfac tin ll nC th
e-
[death]
instinct
... [presents] the q o w ith
.l
flJ fIl lm
cnr
or the
l
atte
r's o ld wishes
for
W hen aggression is prOjected o utwa rd
and
h;1rncs\ed by
u \
' i i7,l ti ()J1,
it w inds
up
d0in g M
l
side w hat it v,;
ould
otherwi se
Ll
o ill. :id,· · redu
cing
th
e world ,
objectif
ying it, it. If we tra
nslat
e
rlm r n c c s ~
back
into
H ege l' s terms, thi s means th ;H th e self refus es the cl :llm of
th e ou tsid e w o rl d (the other)
ro
limit his s ( ) He ;1\
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T I l E BON D i OF L O V E
68
tion
not
of the death instinct
toward zero
tension,
but
of the
break
down of recognition between self and other. Domination presumes a
subject already caught in
,lTTmi
potence,
unable
to
make "liven
contact
with outside
reality,
to
experience
the other person's su bjectivity . But
this apparent
fmt
cause
is itself
the result of an
earlier breakdo
wn
between
self
and
other-which,
though
pervasive,
is
not
inevitable.
Insofar as domination is an alienated form of differentiation, an
effort
to recreate
tension
through distance, idealization, and objectification,
it is destined
to
repeat the original breakdown unless and unSil the
other makes a difference.
D ESTRUCTION AN D SU RVIVAL
Wi
nnicott's idea of destruction
is
about the difference the other can
make.
Destruction,
after
all,
is
a
way
of
differentiating
the
self- the
att empt to pla ce the
other
outside one's fantasy and experience
him
as
external
reality.
I suggest
that
erotic
domination
expresses a basic
differentiating tendency that has undergone a transformation. As we
have seen,
the
fate
of
this
tendency
depends on whether it is met with
the other 's ca
pitulation/retaliation
or survival. In intersubjective
terms,
violation is
the
at t
empt to push
the other outside
the self, to
attack the other's separate reality in order finally
to
discover it. The
adult
sadist, fo r ex
ample, is
sea
rching
for a surviving other, but his
search is already prejudiced
by
his childhood
disappointment
with
an
other who
did not
survive. Likewise, the adult masochist continues
to
fmd an other
who survives, just
as she
did
in
childhood,
but again loses
herself in th e
bargain.
The
contr
o lled
practice
of
sadomasochism portrays
a classic
drama
o f
destruction
and survivaL The thrill of transgression and the sense
of comp lete fr eecto m
for
the sadist depend on the masochist's survivaL
Wh
en the
masochist endures his unremitting attack
and
remains
intact,
the sadist experiences this as lov e. By alleviating his fear (guilt) that
h
is
a ~ g r c s s i o n wil l annihilate her, she creates for him the
fmt condition
69
Master
~ n J 51.1'"
of freedom. By the same to ken , the masochist experiences
as
love the
sharing of ps
yc
hic pain, the o p pommity to ?; iv(' over t(l pain in
tht"
presence
of
a trusted other wh o com
pr eh
ends
the
suffer ing he i
nR
icts.
Hence the love and grat itude that can
accom pany
the- riw:tl
\If
dntll
l
-
nation
when
it
is contained and lim
it
ed .
22
In a child's
development
the
initial
destru
ct io n can be seen
as part of assertion: the desire to affect (nega te) l thers, to be reco
n izcd .
When
destruction fails, the aggression gocs inside and fuels the
sense
of omnipotence.
23
Or i
g inally, there
is
a
kind of
inn oce nce
to the
project of d e
struction.
In
Freud's
theory of sadism- clc
vc
lppl'
c
before
he
introduced
the death instinct
24
- thc in fa
nt
at first ru thkssly att.1c b
and devours th e w o rld
with
no se nse of
co
nscl1uences. At rhis of
primary sadism the c
hild
docs not kn ow about inni
cting
hu rt:
hl
simply
expects to hav e his
cak
e and cat it too.
On
ly
when
the c
hi lL
internalizes his
aggr
ess ion and moves
into
th e masochi st ic pnsiu011 cal
he
imagine
the
pain that might
come
to
the
other.
Th
en " r
t'
:t
r ' sadi
sm
clt
the desire to hurt and reduce the other
as one
has been hurt ()
Il
cs
comes
into
being. 1n short, a ~ g r e s s i o n , i n t e r n a nusochiq r
reap pears
as
sadism.* Through this in ternalization co mes the ab il ity ['
*J c
all
Laplallchc, the Frc-nch ~ l \ S
Ius elabor
ated on r rl'u, l', m",\r:1 f Ii
moveJTIent
from
p
rimary
~ a c l i s to Ilu)ocill sm
tn 'd
d151ll p
rop
er. lie S
lt.: C S ' th,lt
(I
movement of int ern al
intion
turns S l l O n il1 l0 scx u.t
fa
nt asY : [h:\ is,
111
rurnll
i n \ \ " ~ r c l ,
r ( ' s s i o IS "a ll o ye d '"
wi
tb sexuality, W h e ther the f allr:lIY 15
;I CtlVC
('r r ;lS'1
rh
e act
of
"fantasmatization
"
is
d
eCIS
ive: indeed , It
Jc
w
"ll"
c
()
m
ri
wt
c\ s
cxu,
l
li
tv
al1,
1
1
U l 1 c
Sexuality,
by which Laplanche
me
ans thl' r(".l lm of ~ ( - x
t l a
j, [
opP Q, itc F Ero s, a kind of " fren et ic i - l i f wr r ~ - c l l l [' rellcl \ l l , ; l
d l r e c [ putw ard,
to
ward [he
ot h
r he
nc
e
[h e
0 PPC'Sltc'
,'f
rhe l 1 1 w a r
- ' l l r :li '
l r
n
sian th:n lS sex ualit y, It fo llows fro m bp h ncbc\ rlw trUt' np pO
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Tf-l E B O N OS OF l O V E
70
pl
ay b o th roles in fantasy, to expcnence vica riously th e other's part,
an
d
SO enjo
y
the act of violation.
In much of
early
life ,
destruction is
pr ope
rly directed tO wa
rd th e
o ther, and is int ernalized when the other can not catch it,
and
sur
vive . Ordin arily,
som
e failure to survive is inevItabl e; for
that matter,
sO is
the
internalization of
aggression. When
the parent
fails
to
survI
ve
a t tack to
withstand
the des
truction
without retaliating r retreat
i n g t h e
child
turn s its agg ression
inward and develops what
we know
as
rage.
But
when things go
w
dl
this rage o ften dissipates
throu,gh
a
movement
in
the
relationship,
a shift
back to
mutual understanding
that enables the
child
o nce again to feel
the
presence
of
the other. (For
L ,
example
,
th
e child acce
pts
th e
fru
stra
tion
but
communicates
the fantasy
of
retaliation to
the
parent who has
frustrated
him , as in, He re is a
[,ulldozer c omin g
to knock
down the house. )
W
he
n the child
experiences
the
parent
as
caving
in, he
continues
(\
a
ttack,
in
fantasy or reali ty , seeking a
boundary
for his reac
tive
rage.
The
child who has
been indul
ged,
allowed
to abuse hIS mother (or bo th
parents), and given no
limits
to
his fantasy
of omnipotence,
is the
typical sadistic child. ( I can't
control
him, says the
parent,
and th en
repeats for the f[fth time M.ichacl, if you don't behave yo
u'
ll hav e
[
leav
e
the
table
and go up to
your room. ) Fo r
him,
the real object,
the one
who
cannot
be
destroyed ,
never
comes
into
view.
Fo
r
him
,
agency a
nd
assertion are
not integrat
ed
in
the
context
o f mutuality and
respect for the other but in
the
context
of
control and
retaliation.
The
sadist-child
is
itively
aware
of
the
difference between self and
other, but
emotion lly thi
s awareness
is hollow and
doc s
not
counteract
the desire to control the other.
\V h
en
th
e
par
e
nt
caves in , the
child
e
xp
er iences his e
xpanding
clation, gr andiosi ty, and
self-absorption
as fl y ing off into
space-he
~ i m i to i n n i c o t t s distinction between having an ~ c t i o n with
th
e outside 0lhcr
Jn
d rela t
in
g tt) th
r
object
as
on
c's mental
product
- a tw o
-p
erson a one-person
cx
perience.
71
M : I ~ [ l r lld S
laVl
finds no li
mi t
s, no o
thern
e
ss.
The
wor
ld now see ms e
mp
(v llfall
hlllna11
li fe, there is no o ne to co nn ec t
with,
th e w
orld
is al l me
.
As the
anal
ys
t Sheldo n
Ba
ch descr ib C s it, wh e n
th
e self fecls a
bsnlutc. :\
loss
of different
iatio
n oc cu rs in wh ich the subject an d object :n c l1ne; the
[pe rso n] has e
ate
n
up
reali ry . 2(, W h at the c
hild
fee ls is s0111c rh
in .
lik e
this : W hen
the
other
crum
bles
un d
er
th
e i
mp
act
nf
Ill
y
aer,
th
ell
my
act
seem
s to drop
off the
edge of
th
e w o
rld
inra cmptines'\, l1ld I cel
that I wi ll soon follow. In thi s vo id beg inS (he Joss of tenSion or
boundaries,
a by-product of
lo
sing th e o ther.
Surv iv ;d means that th e paren t can
tol
era te A a t i rh e child 's
grandiosity
eno
ugh-
hu
t Ju st Cl10 U h to let him
kn
ow t \ut be em
go o n ly so far and no
further,
th at so m
eo
ne el se 's necds :lnd rC31tty
se
t a limit
to
his mental feats. T he
parent
must feel se
pa
r
ate
:lnd secure
e
no u
g h to be able to to lera te t he thw:lr ted chJl
d's
ange r Wlthr lll l v i n ~
in. Ot
herwise the
pa
rent
is dest
ro
yed
In th t
' ch
il d'
s
C'ves. The child
in
vo lved
in the proce
ss
o f destruction
is
like lcaru, fl yi
ng
tflO l1l '
J.f
the
sun. W hen th e parent sC ts limits , she is act ua ll y p r o t t he child
from the dissol
ution that occurs
when
the
abs() lute sel f has m \vay. O f
course,
as
w e will see in our discussion o f
ma
sochism, the c
hild
who
is
ne
ve
r all owed
to
destroy c
an
nl'\'l' r
assumc
the p
ower
lO Av
or
di sco ver his lim its.
The conversion fro m assert
ion
to o n , fro m intcractlon
t)
mental control,
wo r
ks in tand em. Wh('n th in gs arc no t resolved
l l l t -
side, between self
and
ot her, the in te raction
is
tra
nsferre
d int o the
world
of
fantasy; this
includ
es ide ntify
in
g with
th
e o ll e we h;mn . The
drama of reversible violator an
d v
ictim disp
laces til('
te
m i
on of interac
tion w ith the o the r. This drama
now
oc
curs
wi thi n th
l'
(l mn ipL'tcncc
of mental
life,
the enc
apsu lat ed sp
here
o f
th
e intrapsy ch ic. In successfu l
destru
ct ion (wh
en the
o
th
er sur v ive s),
th
e d istin cti on be tween men tal
acts and w hat happ ens out th e
re in
reality e c o r n c . ~ more th an a
co
gniti ve aw areness; it
bec
om es a fe lt exp
er
i
ence.
The
d l ~ t i n c t i o n
be
twe en
my
fantasy of
yo
u
anJ yo
u as a
re
al
pers
on
is
the
ve
ry
~ s m e
o f co nn ection.
T he underly
ing them
e
of sa
d
ism th
e
arrc
m p r [ brcrik through
to
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TH
BONDS OF
LO V
E
7
th e o th er. Th e desire to be discovered underlies its counterpart,
namely, masochism. Emmanuel
Ghent
has called this desire the wish
for surrender, for
which su
bmission
is
th e eve
r-ready
100k-alike. 27
Li
ke
the
sadi st's aggression, the masochist's submission is ambiguous,
conf1ating
the repetition of
an
old frustration and the wish for some
thing
new.
Ghent
suggests that it is a wish
to br
eak
out
of
what
Winnicott
called the false self.
The
false self is the compliant,
adaptive
self
that h
as
staved off chaos by accepting the
ot h
er's directi o n
and
co
ntrol , tha t has maintained connection to the object by ren.ounc
ing ex
plo
ration,
aggression, separateness.
This co
mpli
ance is associated with ano ther kind of fail ed
childhood
destruct ion, o ne in w h ich the sclfhas not survived. Th e masochistic
child has endured n
ot
cav ing in but retaliation, in
the
form
of
either
pun lsh me nt
or
withdrawal. He destroys the oth er on ly in
fanta
sy; he
will
never
take a full swing at the parent to test if
sh
e will
survive.
Hi
s r
age
is
turned
inward
and apparently spares the
other, yet
the
loss
of a
viable
external
other
overshadows the struggle to differentiate.
The
masochist
despairs
of
ever
holding
the attention
or
winning th e
recognition of the other, of being securely held in the other's mind.
Contemporary
Freudian
ego psychology has often understood sub
mission as a failure to separate and as an inhibition of aggression. But,
as
Ghent suggests,
framing
masochism as the desire
for
self-disco very
in the space
provided by
the other allows us to recognize the
wish
as
well as the defense. The masochist's self is false because, lacking this
space, he has not been able to reaL ze the desire and agency that come
from within. He has not experienced his impulses and acts as his
own,
arising wi
th
o ut direction from outside. This
experience
is what he
longs for , al t
hough
he may
not know
it.
8
Ma
sochism can be seen, therefore, not only as a str.ategy
for escaping
loneness, but also as a search for aloneness with the other: by letting
the
oth
er remain in control, the masochist hop es to fmd a
safe
open
space in which to abandon the protective false self and all
ow
th e
nascent,
hidd
en sel f to emerge .
Within
thi s space, he seeks an opportu
nity for W innicot t 's transitional experience free of the self-conscious
73 \ a ~ r t · r
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E
BO
N
DS Of L
OV
E
74
lO t purge sexual
fantasy-it
plays
with
it. The idea of destruction
·cIl1 inds us that the element of aggression is necessary in
erotic
life; it
S the element of SUTiJ/IJo/ the difference the other can make, which
hstinguishes ero tic union, which plays with the fantasy
of
) m i n a t i o n ,
:rorn r ea l dom ination.
As
I suggested earlier, in erotic un ion losing onesel f and
being
wholly there occur together,
as
if with ou t
contradiction.
The se nse of
l
os
ing oneself creatively ,
of
becoming absorbed in the
other
is
often
only a hairsbread th away
from se
lf-absorption.
2 9
In ero tic union, the
fundamental experience of attum:ment-that separate
individual
s can
share
the same feeling- is affIrmed.
Erotic
domination, on the other
h a
nd, ex
emplifIes the fatality of disso lving
paradox into polarity (split
ting) e ven as it
sh
ows it to be the endpoint of a
complex
process, and
not simplY the orig inal human condition.
DOMINATION AND THE SEXUAL DIFFERENCE
It
might
seem that the aSSOciation
of
domination and gender is obvious:
men, after all, hav e everywhere
dominated
women, and one would
expect
this to color erotic relationships as well.
Yet,
even if w e
accepted this logic , we would still want to understand
how
the subJU
ga
tion
of
wo
men tak es hold in the psyche and shapes the pattern of
domination.
Furthermore, i t is increasin gly apparent that the roles of
master and slave are not intrinsically or exclusively male and female
respecti vely; as th e original "
ma
soch ist" o f
Venus
in
Furs
(Leopold von
Sacher-Masoch) reminds us,
th
e opposite
is often
true: the actual
practice of sadomasoc hism freguently reverses heterosexual patterns.
And, for that matter, sadomasochism is just
as likely
to occur in
lornosexual relationships. The question w e are addressing, the
refore,
is
not
wh y are men sadists and women ma sochists, since this need not
be
th
e case;
but
rather, how have sadism and masochism
become
associated with masculinity and femininity?
The deep structure of gend er complementarity has pcrsisted despite
7S
Ma s te r anri Sla ·c
the increased flexi bili ty of
con
temporary [() To l l1d em and th e
origins o f mal e
master
y a
nd
female submiss ion, we m ust l
ook : t
th e
cha
rac teristic course taken by each gender in the ea rly d iffC
rt
,nti .ltlnn
proc
ess. Since women have a
lmos
t every where been th e prim:lry car e
takers of small children, bot h boys
anJ
r l s have diffc rcnti:ttcd in
re
lation
to
a w o
ma n
-
th
e m Other.* W hen
we lo
o k
to
the
ty
pica
l
course
of male
diff
erentia ti
on, we see ar once
that this creates a
~ : c i ;
difficulty for bo ys. While all children identify with their fi N lo v e d
one, boys must dissolve thi s identifIcation
and
defll1c th cm s
dvn .15
t h e
diff
erent sex. Initi a
ll
y all
inf
an ts fee l themselves
ro
be like their orh
ers. But boys di sc
over
that they cannot g
row
up to /7 ('
((1 11/1'
ha ; dll'y
can
only /](1 J
her.
This
discov ery leads
to
a hreak in ick m i
(i
c ui n n
for
boys which ·g irls arc spared. M31e
children
:lchi cvt' tiw
lr
m,\\cu -
lini ty by deny ing their origina l idenri fl Cltio
ll or
o
nc
ness \\ j th thei r
mothers.
l
R obe rt
Stoller\
work
on
the development and disrupti OIl of gender
identIty has offe red much ins
ig
ht into this
pro
cess. H e has pm p
mcd
that male
identity
is a secondary
phenomen
o n, since
it
is achi eved h v
overcomin g a primary identification with th e mother. Th is pl)s iti o n.
so contrary to Freud's a
ss
umption thar children of both as
"little me
n,
has wide ramifIcations. F
ur
the
boy
to bc n )tn v masculin e,
write
s
Stoller,
h e must separ:n e himself in the
ou t
id c
wo r
ld tWil l h is
moth
er's female
body
and in his inside worlel
from
his ow n alread v
formed primary identification with femalen
es
s
3.nd
fc m in
il1J
t \ .
gr
c lt
task is
often not completed
31
Th
e boy deve lops his gender and id
enti
ty by means (1f estab lishin g
discontinuity and difference from the pers
on
to w hom he is mo s
*D espirc wOl1l
cn
's un iv
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T E BONDS
OF
LOVE
76
at tac
he
d.
Th
is process of disidentifica
tion
32
explains the repudiation of
the mother that
underli
es conventional masculine identity formation,
and
results in a kind of
fault
line"
runn
ing
through
the male achieve
m en t of individuality.
The tendency of e
rotic
love to become erotic
domination
can be
seen as a casualty
of
this characteristically male form
of
establis
hing
separation.
Th
e need to sever the identification
with
the
mother
in
orde r to be
confmn
ed
both as
a separate person
and
as a male per son -
and
for
the boy these are hard to distinguish-often preve
nt
s th e boy
from
recognizing his
mother.
She is
not
se
en as
an independent pers
on
(another Sll byct), bu t as something other-as nature, as an instrumen t
or ob ject, as less
than
human.
Th
e premise of hi s independence is to
,ay, "1 am nothin g like she who cares
for
me."
An
objectifying attitude
comes to replace the earlier intera ctio ns of in fancy in
which
mutual
recog nition and
proud
assertion could still coexist. Male identit y, as
N a
ncy
Chodorow
points
out,
emphasizes
only
o ne side
of
th
e balance
of differentiation- difference over sharing, se pa ra ti on over connec
tion, boundaries ove r co
mmuni
on, self-suffici
ency
over dependency.))
In breaking th e identificati on
with
and dependency on mother, the
boy is in dan ger of lo sing his capacity for mutual recognition alto
gether. The emotional attunemcnt and bodil y
harmony
that character
ized his infantile exchange with mother now th reaten his
identity.
He
is, of course, able cognitively to accept the principle that th e other is
separate,
but without
the experience of
empathy
and shar ed
fe
eling
that can unite separate subJectivities. Instead, th e other, especially the
female other, is related to as object. When this relations
hip
with
the
other
as
object is generalized, rationality s
ub
s
titute
s for affective ex
change
with
the
o t h e r . ) ~ This
rati onality bypasses real recogn ition-
of
the other's subjectivity. The process mi ght be called "false differentia
.
"
tlOp .
l Violatiory is an
elaboration
of
th i
s one-sided, or "false," differentia
tion, assert ing absolute difference from ltsobJ ect, an object
we
can now
se
c as represe
nting
the m o
th
er.
35
A fantasy
of
maternal power, of bei ng
reabsorbed , underlies this curious method of asserting djfference.
Th
e
M;)
S(
cr
ann
S I
danger
that violation
is meant
to
opp ose- t
he
u ltimate l \ ~
of
tc
sion- is easily
equated
with the return to
on e
n ess wit h the
mo
th
and can now be evoked by any pw fo und exper ience o f cl
cpcndcn
l
or co
mmuni
on
(e moti
onal or
ph
ysICal), slIch :l.S erotic I( Vt'
.
T he 011
defense against l
os
in g difference lies in the power feLu io
ship so
that
the
ma
ster n
ow
co n
tr o
ls
the
o th er,
\\
·
hilc
su ll
pr
ocla
i
mu
hi s
boun
dari es intact.
*
Eroti
c domination represe
ll
ts an intensifi cation of malt- .1Ilxict) al
defense in relation
to
the mo the r. The
c p l l d materna
l
. . . ,
persists as th e object to be done to and violated , to be
sc
paf:ncd f
rnI
to
have pow er over,
to
f> Thus, on a visit to Sir Sterhe)
v illa in the South, 0 thinks how fortun ate it is that
d l
,\ ;,n'
(ar (1'1 1
the sea, for the sea smells like
dUlI
g
lJIer
= sea
I
,;n =
1// l /J I
r/.
furtber
c
ompli es
in
the
d e n i g r of wh at is s
pe
cifi cal l\'
fC
ll1.l l
t'
her s
exuality
when Sir Stephen u
ses
her as a boy, th:l r i
s,
d e n i h
feminine
or
gans.
The
anal
a l l L l ~ i ) n s
de grade \ v· ha t
wo
man
: t ~
to
l i l l
her bodily difference
from
man.
I t i s precisely thi s obj ectification, com bin ed wi th maintai n ing :l bst
lute difference
and
control, that informs the master's tra nsgression . TJ
vulnerability of a masculinity th
at
is
for
ged in th e cruc ihle
oj
fl' ll1mi,
ity,
the
great
task"
of
separatio n
that
is
S0 se
lck'm comp leted,
la yS rl
groundwork for the lat er objectification of wo m
en
.
Th
e mot her stan,
as the
protot
ype of tb e undifferenti ated ob y
ct.
She m en as [he
other, their c o u n t e r p ~ r t the side of them
se
l
ves
they re
pr
ess.
\-
Th
e
vi
ew
of
moth
er as
o ~ j e c t
t
hr
o u g ho
ut
o
ur cu
lture.
I
general psychoanal y tic discour
se
, th e child rela tes to the
)1
lOrhcr as
*Of cour se, as
we
have scen , the inl lnt is neve r iitcrally
on
e wi th moth
er
, hUf rill'
ident ification is ret ro acti ve ly called (rCprcsl"ntcd
l l y a,)
" ')ll< ne .. I.e. . rI
absence of a fundamental differen ce .
The
de rm se agai ns t I)ncn C5S clevl'lop s Kcord ing
a pri ncip le of reversal: I will
do
to y 'u what I perceive you arc dO lllg tn Ille, f J r crcl'I'
y our lov e as
stifling I ll) subjectlvlfy,
J
will - agai
n.
Jo
n
.den\' ) l I r Th
l
as comp
lem entarity is no longer temp e re d
bv
comm
ona lity. c l l < arr:
ar
\ I.'v,
mor e absolute
and thr
ea.tening.
http:///reader/full/mother.35http:///reader/full/mother.35http:///reader/full/mother.35http:///reader/full/mother.35http:///reader/full/mother.35http:///reader/full/mother.35http:///reader/full/mother.35
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TJ-t E
BOND
S OF
I.O
VE
78
an o
bject
of his drives, a
nd
corres
pondingly
deva lu
es her
indepe
ndent
su bj ectivity. Independence from
th
e mother as obj e
ct
rather than rec
o g
nition
of her as subject constitutes the essence of individ ua tiOli . ·And
th
ese
assumptions
arc part
of
a large r problem:
to
th e
ex tent
that until
recently man" and individual were syno nymous, the mal e experi
en
ce
of
diff
erentiati on has s
tamp
ed
the
im
age of
individuality.
The
image o f the o ther that predominates
in
Western thought is no t that
of a vitally real presence
but
a cognitively perceived objec
t.
In th is
sense
falsc
differentiation has been a constant component
of
the
Western version of individuation. Recog nizing the other has been th e
exceptional mom ent, a
moment of
rare innocence, the re
cove
ry
of
a
los t parad ise.
Th
e complement to the mal e refusal to recogni ze the other is
woman's ow n acceptance of her lack of subjectivity, her willingness
to offer recognition w ithou t expect ing it in return. (The classic
ma t
er
nal ideal of m
othe
rhood
a
paragon
of
self-abne ga tio
n - i
s only a
beautification of this lack.) The female difficulty in
differentiation
can
be describ ed almost
as
the mirror image
of th
e male's:
not
the d enial
of
the
other, but the den ial
of
the selJ. Thus
the
fact of women's
mothering n o t only ··explains mascu line sadism, it also reveals a fa ult
line in female development that leads to masochism. Whereas the
boy's
earl y difficulty see ms to occllr in making the
switc
h to a mascu
line identifIcation , the girl req uir es no such shift in identification away
from her mother. This ma kes her identity less problematic, but
it
is
a disadvantage
in
that she possesses no obvious
way
of disidcntifying
from her mother, no
hallmark
of separateness.
The
feminine tende
ncy
therefore
is
not to emphasize but to und erplay independence.
As
Chodorow has argued, mothers tend to identify more str on g ly
with their daughters; whereas they push their sons o ut of the nest, th
ey
ha
ve gre
ater
difficulty sep
ar
ating from daughters.
38
Thus it is more
likely that girls would fear separateness and tend to sustain th e tie to
mother thr o ugh compliance and self-denial. If not acute, this tenden cy
would be unremarka
bl
e. But the girl's relatio
nship
to the moth er,
79
la s t .'r ,I S
b y
('
emphasizing me rging and c
ont
inui ty a t the ~ < . of indivi llu.lliry
and
independence ,
provides
fert ile gn)
lll1
d for
sub
mi
ss
ion.
Submi
ss
ion , as we s
aw
in M} is often Ill
Niva
tcd till'
fC.J.r
of separation an d aband o nm ent : i ~ m
c t 1 e
th e inahlli ty t
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TH
DONDS
or
L O V E
RO
that
ha s dogged psy cho ana lyt
tC
deba te sin ce Freud's co nce
pt
of
femi-
nine maso
chism
was elaborated by
Mari
e Bonaparte
and
Hc ene
D e utsch to include the
notion
that masochism is an inev itable compo-
n en t
o ff
emale sexuality, chIldb
ea
ring, and motherhood .
4
'J Und ema bly,
femininity and motherhood as we
know
them have
bee
n tainted
wi
th
submissi
on, self-abnegation, and helple ssnes
s.
This
is
true
even
when
submission
works
to conceal
or de
lly the power that women as mothers
do exercise.
And this fact, that
women
participate in th eir own submission, has
often embarrassed critics of psychoanalytic theory . So me feminist
critic s, who feel that \\'Ol11en have unju s
tl
y borne the
burd
en of their
v ictimjzatio n, have ins isted that
women
are simpl y unw illing con-
sc
ripts
in an erotic fantasy formed by and for men- v ictims of the
m ale porn og raphic ima
gi
nation. Susan Griffin, for
example,
argues
that the subjugation
of
wo men can be equated with the repression of
natUfe .
41
Bu t , in fact, wom en arc not the
embodiment
of llature,
althou gh the y have long been captives of that metaphor. Ind eed , in
accepting that equati on,
women
once again
participat
e in their ow n
s
ubjugation
. \Vomen , like men , are by nature social,
and
it is the
repression of their sociabil ity and social agency- t h e repress ion
of the
social , intersubject ive side of the self_. that is at
is
s
Lle. Th
e equatio n
wom n = tnothcrhood
=
nature is a symptom, not a cure.
Fmbr
ac in g
this equation, femini sts have become
cau
ght in a contradiction: exa
lt-
ing women's maternal nature while di sclaiming wo m en's masochis-
tic
nature.
Ar guing from a different standpoint, the psychologist P aula Caplan
has ren ewed the battle against the psychoanalyti c positio n
that women
are in nately masochistic. Caplan attacks the idea of " ple asure in
pain in great detail , but,
un f
ortunatcl y, sidesteps th e issue of
su
bm is
si
on
. Her exp lanation for m asochi sm is that w ha t is called m asochist ic
has tended to be the very essence of trained feminini ty in W estern
culture."42 H er argument implies that social learning of a cultural
myth about w om anhood suffices to explain the prese
nce
of ma sochistic
fantasi es in wo men , or t
hat
the
ass
ociation
of femin init
y with maso
81
Master and S
lave
chism is the res ult
merel
y
of
a per joratlve view o f l1l
l
tcmall1l1rtllfance
and al truism. Caplan is
ri
g ht th at the o f fc
min
i111ty wah
ma
s
oc
hism persists in th e
cult
ure; bur the ('x
pia
n:ltion f
or
that persis
te
nce cannot be sought in soc.ial l r a r n i n ~
.
From a psychoanal ytic
po int of
view , it
is
unsa
ri
sf
acton t tl1nc
ly
attribute
th
e
pe r
v as iveness o f
mbmi
ss
ion f;lllt
as
ics in
l Wt lC
Ille
to
cultural labeling or the derogation of wo men. T he a
lt
ernative to
,
l
bi o log ical explanation of m asoc hism must be sou g h t no t on lv in
culture, bu t in th e in te
raction
If
cultur
e and psycho log ical processes.
Cultur
al myths an d label s, w hi le ul1c \rlUbtcdly dest ruc t ive , st ill dn
not
ex plain
bow th e
essence
of t rained fe rn
i
nini t )''' ~ e t s in l
)
W{)ll1( n \;
head
s and is
there con
ve rte d in to ple asurable f
ant
asies of ernr ic
s l h m i ~ -
sion .
To
begin to explain it , w e m us t start W
ith
rhe way i
ll
hieh the
mo ther 's lack of subjectivity, as percei ved by hot h mak :lf1d
fc
mak
children, crcates an internal propem ity row ard fem inine m J . \ ) c h i ~ l l l
an d male sadism . Label
ing
is
a result,
not
a
ca
llse,
of that pro
pens ity_
Notwithsta
nding
the persistence
of
these gend er
as
sociati ons, it 1:;
safe
to
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82
T H E BONDS OF L OVE
A t the s:tmc time, and ironicall y, the fantasy
of
e
ro t
ic
dominanc
e
and
submission expresses the deep
longing for who
leness.
But as long
as
the
shape of the
wh
ole
is not informe
d
by mutualit
y, this
lon
gin g
o n l
y
leads an unequal
complementarity in
which
one
person
a y ~
rna.ster, the other slave.
And
even when m en and
women
reverse their
roles
,
as
th
ey often do, the sense o f
"playing
the
oth
e
r"
is ne ver los
t.
Gend
er contimlf's , con sciously and
unconsciously, to
repr
ese
nt only
on
C
part
of a polarized
whole,
one aspect
of th
e
self-other
relationship.
One
person ("
th
e
woman") is not allowed to
play
the
s u b j ~ c
one
p e
rs
o n
("th
e m an") arrogates subjec
tivit
y onl y to himse lf. Again, the
ground
work for this division
is
laid in th e ,
mother's renunciation
of
her
o wn
\ : i
11, in her
CODS('qllent
lack of su bjecti vi ty for her c
hildren,
and particularly in
t ·
male chiler, rep"Jiation o f his , nmJ1lonality
with her.
It
wo
uld
seem obv ious that this lack
of
maternal
subjectivity
is a
great,
if
n ot the greatest,
imp
ediment to
the
e
xperience
of
succ e$stul
destrllction and surv ival
by
both
male and
fe
male childr
en. Only a
mother who feels entitled to be a person in her own right can eve r
be seen
as
slIch
by
her child, and only
suc
h a m o ther can
appreciate
and set limits to th e inevitable ag gress
ion and
anxiety
that accompa
ny
a child's
grow
ing independenc
e.
Only someone
who fully
ac
hiev
es
subjectivi ty can s
urvive
destruction a
nd
permit full differe
nt
iation.
This fact has been remarkably elusive.
It
seems
intoler
able
to
the
narcissism
of
adults
and
children alike
that
the
limits a
mother se ts
sho uld not merely be an occasional d ose
of medicine correspondin
g to
the child's needs,
but might
actu a
lly proceed from
the mother's asser
tion
of
her ow n separate selfh
oo
d. The possibi li ty of balancin g the
recogniti o n
of
the c
hild 's
needs with the assertion
of
o ne's own has
scarcely b
ee
n
put forward as an
ideal.
It is thu s neces
sa
ry
to
reconceive th e
ideal-and
the
reality
- o f
moth
e
rho
od in order
to
realign the
process
o f differe
ntiation, to miti
gate the splitting int o
complementarity.
Th e structure
of
individuation
which permeates our culture, and which privile
ge
s
separation
over
de
pendence,
cannot
simply
be
countered b y its
mirror op posit
e.
RJ
\1;!Q c:r anrl ; t \ ~
R ather ,
it
must
be critici zed in
lilZh
t
of
a o f a
b
.1l:ll1Cl'
in which
neither polt: domi nates the
ot
her , in w h ic h para
do
x ~ m r . 1 i l 1 l d
This
vis
ion
is
imp
ortallt to a fcminist crJtiqul' l'spt'Clal ly
no w
that
m ale
and
female roles arc no
as
bind in g as th
ey
',111Cl'
were.
Toda
y
wo
men in some
s e r t o r of
soci ety may
:lcl
o
pt
t he
S:lmL'
L'm ph:ui
c
autonom
y, the same "fa
lse
" diffe re
nt
ia
ti on
at
the ('xpeme l l f
rca l
recogni t ion and attunement,
that
has hern c,[orc ch aracterized the ideal
of masculine individuality
. The
stCfeo
type
of
the " ca r
eer
v\'nman"
i\
th
3t she is
able to
be
as
detached and i
mptrsn
nal
"as
a
111 :111
." Hut
r h i ~
individuat
ion based
on
den ying the need for
oth
ers is h:1rd ly lib
8/16/2019 Benjamin Master and Slave
18/18
T £ ONDS OF LOVE
84
recognition
to the
other,
and to rediscover
the
lost tension betw een
self
and other.
Th
is tension, a fragile balance, to be sure, can only be
sustained through the
lived
experience of recognitioni the meeting of
separate
minds. have
argued
that the
longing
for recognition lies
beneath
the sensationalism
of power and
powerlessness, that the un-
recognizable
forms
often
taken
by
our
desire are the result
of
a
complicated
but
ultimately
understandable process-a process
which
explains
how our deepest desires for freedom and
communion
become
implicated
in
control
and submission.
From
such desi
res
the bonds
of
love
are forgc
J.
CH A P T R
T H R E E
WOIIl a n '
s
es ir e
THE DISCUSSION OF erot ic domina
ti on has show n
how
the
breakdown
of
the
tension b
et ween ass
e
ru on
and recognition
becomes aSSOCIated
wi
th the polar
in -
tion of gender
identity. Male and female each ado
pt one
side of an
interl
ocking who le. T his o n
e-
sIded chara
ctC[
of differ
en t
iat
ion
evolves
in
r
espo
n
se to
th e
mothe
r 's
lack of subjectivity,
WIth
w hich the g irl ide
nt
ifIes and
the boy disidentifics.
This
cha
pte
r will focus on
woman s la
ck of subjcct i\' -