Adam Curtis
The Century of the Self

There was a period in my life when, with two dear friends, we decided to boycott that tedious life in provincial bars. We spent afternoons and evenings in the fields, sometimes illegal fishing and debating various topics, the most recurrent of which was psychoanalysis. I always had to address the issue in opposition to my two contenders; they were enthusiastic about Jung's readings and unwavering defenders of the rational introspective model, while I was a spokesperson for the cosmic man in a sort of spiritual irrationalism suggested to me by readings of Eastern mysticism.

The issue of psychoanalysis didn't touch me for two decades, relegated to a dusty box in the mind's archive labeled as; ineffective remedy for bourgeois ailments.

Only the encounter with somatherapy, about ten years ago, rekindled a slight interest in Wilhelm Reich's orgasmic theories in me, but I had already had more than enough of that for years.

Not long ago, I saw this eye-opening documentary that compelled me to pick up that box and place it next to much more significant archives; the crucial historical events of our century. In other words, I discovered that psychoanalysis is used as a tool of mass control. Was it logical? Obvious? Perhaps. But how is it possible that such a fundamental element in the formation of our society escaped me so? Is it my shortcoming, or is it still a hidden element?

The fact is that this documentary illustrates historical and social facts in detail through footage from the era and interviews that make the content indisputable. The documentary is divided into four parts, each about an hour long, and since the narrative process is linear, from the twenties to the nineties, I will summarize the content of the first part:

Freud's ideas were not well received in Austrian society of his time, but World War I seemed to prove him right, showing how dangerous man's primordial instincts are when unleashed. With the United States entering the war, Woodrow Wilson decided to create a media campaign to garner support for the war effort. Thus, propaganda was born (a term abandoned after it was used by the Nazis in favor of "public relations"). The key figure in all of this was Edward Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud. After the success achieved with propaganda, he decided to use his uncle's ideas to get rich, and in peacetime, he worked for large industries, associating products with the most irrational desires and feelings. Bernays' methods were a perfect fit for the large corporations that feared a crisis of overproduction due to the heavy investment in infrastructure during World War I. What better opportunity to transform the culture of necessity into that of desire, giving rise to a new society, the consumer society.

The subsequent publication of Freud's books in the United States created a stir among the intellectuals of the time, and the new ideas, that is, that human beings could catalyze unconscious destructive forces (what was thought to have happened in the Russian Revolution) called into question one of the democratic principles that citizens could be trusted. It was then necessary to think of a new democracy capable of controlling these instincts through psychological techniques. This new direction was indicated by Walter Lippman and immediately embraced by Bernays as a great opportunity to ensure that these instincts were mitigated through consumerism. The engineering of consent was born, designing a society centered on the consumer individual, capable of keeping the economy healthy and, by satisfying their most unconscious desires, becoming happy and docile, perfect for a stable society.

All this until the stock market crash of 1929, where there would be what might be the last reaction of the state in the face of unbridled liberalism, namely Delano Roosevelt's New Deal. But the big corporations certainly wouldn't sit idly by, and here our Bernays resurfaces once again...

Here I stop. There would be much more to address, too much. But this is the genesis of the formation of contemporary Western societies. I don't deem any personal observations necessary. This writing stems from the desire to spread this information, which we should all know, to better understand how the environment in which we live was generated.

Therefore, watching the documentary becomes obligatory if we have a healthy curiosity or that desire to know, to understand the world in which we live, to make certain aspects that permeate our society and our poor democracy more transparent and, who knows, maybe try to change something in our lives.