A critique of Universality of Incest (as well as some aspects of The Origins of War in Child Abuse)
DeMause begins his essay “The Universality of Incest” by citing the findings of Freud and other early psychoanalysts as well as those of non-scholars whose stated objective was to normalize pedophilia by showing how common it has always been. In the first instance, DeMause repeatedly stresses how Freud, by interviewing his patients, came to believe that incestuous child sex-abuse was(henceforth referred to as CSA) “more common than previously thought”. He frames his statements so that one is intentionally encouraged to forget that what is being discussed are the experiences of psychologically ill persons, where victims of CSA are extremely likely to be overrepresented, choosing instead to describe individual memories, among them those of Freud himself in lurid, emotionally painful detail. Though he says nothing strictly untruthful, the intention to create a strong emotional response to warp our perception of future facts is undeniable. The chorus of “There is more, much more of t