Page - 16 - in Rebels without a cause? - ‘Criminals’ and fascism in The Authoritarian Personality

16 Journal of Classical Sociology 00(0) would examine the fundamental dangerousness of the delinquent personality beyond the concrete offence (Lindner, 1945: 280). Variations of ‘pseudo rebellion’ In his discussion of the rebel, Lindner explains that a ‘scientific’ diagnosis – from psy- chopathic inferiority to moral delusion to sociopathy – was difficult because the resistant objects would block the respective label and boldly change their symptoms. The only unifying symptom was therefore that of the person being a rebel: Symptomatologically, then, the description of psychopathy derives from the consideration of the culture in which it appears and to which it is relative. Considered in this light, the psychopath [. . .] is a rebel, a religious disobeyer of prevailing codes and standards. Moreover, clinical experience with such individuals make it appear that the psychopath is a rebel without a cause, an agitator without a slogan, a revolutionary without a program: in other words, his rebelliousness is aimed to achieve goals satisfactory to himself alone. (Lindner, 1944: 2) Lindner’s Harold as rebel was the main inspiration for TAP’s criminal high scorer, who was believed to be someone who had dealt ‘incorrectly’ with his oedipal conflicts. The high scorer loves and hates his overbearing father – a sometimes covert, sometimes open reference to Erich Fromm’s sado-masochistic authoritarian character (Fromm, 1936). The simultaneity of ‘fear of authority’ (Fromm, 1936: 96, my translation) and ‘pleasure in obedience and submission’ (Fromm, 1936: 110, my translation) weakens the ego, which unconditionally submits to authority. This results in the inability to criticise authority and instead in its stereotypical idealisation; any form of revolt against this authority by the high scorer is then a ‘pseudo rebellion’. But this is where the apparent agreement between Fromm and Lindner ends. The superficially identical concepts of pseudo rebellion do not share the same content. In Morrow’s chapter, the theory of pseudo rebellion reads as follows: Sometimes they express feelings of victimization toward parents and other authorities [. . .]. But these feelings are overpersonalized: the prejudiced men cannot really criticize antidemocraticness as such; instead, they feel themselves singled out – as individuals, as ‘the poor people’ or whatnot – for ‘persecution.’ Their furtive resentment of parents and other authorities can be expressed only in pseudo rebellion, often delinquent or fascist; and in prejudice against mythically ‘dominant’ groups such as Jews, who symbolize the hated parental power and values – i.e., by ‘growling’ defiantly while expressing the very authoritarianism ‘growled’ against. There are signs that, to bolster their weakened masculinity and independence, these men have tried to identify with the external aspects of the resented parents – i.e., parental authoritarianism, status and power, especially that of the father. (Adorno et al., 1950: 875f.) This differs in essential points from the psychoanalytic observations on which it is implicitly based and does not fit the San Quentin data. It also differs from Fromm’s ideas. First, the rebellion described here as an over-personalisation was completely impersonal