Gordon Gekko's personality disorders analyzed through Freudian psychoanalysis

¶ … character from a movie, Gordon Gekko from Wall Street (Stone, 1987) from the psychoanalytic perspective of Dr. Sigmund Freud. This paper will pair several quotes of Gekko with the appropriate handicap. In particular, this will illustrate Gekko's two personality disorders: Antisocial Personality Disorder and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

This will close by summarizing these faults and then and presenting an opinion of how well these theories describe the person in question. In addition, the appropriate therapeutic approach will be followed by a couple esteemed quotes to enhance a better identification.

Introductory Quotation

Psychoanalysis comprises several interlocking theories concerning the functioning of the mind. The term also refers to a specific type of treatment where the analyst, upon hearing the thoughts of the analyzed (analytic patient), formulates and then explains the unconscious basis for the patient's symptoms and character problems. Unconscious functioning was first described by Sigmund Freud, who modified his theories several times over a period of almost 50 years (1889-1939) of attempting to treat patients who suffered with mental problems. In the past 70 years infant and child research and new discoveries in adults have led to further modification of theory. During psychoanalytic treatment, the patient tells the analyst various thoughts and feelings. The analyst listens carefully, formulates, then intervenes to attempt to help the patient develop insight into unconscious factors causing the problems. The specifics of the analyst's interventions typically include confronting and clarifying the patient's pathological defenses, wishes and guilt. Through the analysis of resistance (unconscious barriers to treatment), and transference to the analyst of expectations, psychoanalysis aims to unearth wishes and emotions from prior unresolved conflicts, in order to help the patient perceive and resolve lingering problems (New World Encyclopedia, 2008).

Introduction

Using Freud's psychoanalytical approach, and the incorporation of which therapeutic approach should be employed in concern to the psychoanalysis of Gordon Gekko from the film Wall Street (Stone, 1987) will be twofold: 1) diagnosis, and 2) practical therapy. First, point out the evident faults; next, create a conscious awareness of these faults and determine a means by which to work around these obstacles.

Dr. Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytical approach is fundamentally set around human behaviors and purpose. More than that, his approach incorporates the study of human psychological as well as sociological; first and foremost, humans are a social breed of mammal. Based upon that, from A Glossary of Psychoanalytic Terms and Concepts (Moore), here are the three applications of Psychoanalysis:

a method of investigation of the mind and the way one thinks; a systematized set of theories about human behavior; a method of treatment of psychological or emotional illness.

With this in mind, Gordon Gekko is now set to experience Dr. Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytical approach. From this following quote alone, within the film a duality of psychoanalytical constituents becomes evident:

"In the last seven deals that I've been involved with, there were 2.5 million stockholders who have made a pretax profit of 12 billion dollars. Thank you. I am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them! The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms: greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge, has marked the upward surge of mankind" (Stone, Wall Street, 1987)

From the view of the capitalistic mindset, this quote beautifully splices two rather evident perspectives together: it takes that perspective of the individual, the independent laborer who must make the utmost priority in watching out for the "I," and then straddles that fine line between the better benefit of the group. Humans are social; we all only benefit optimally by working together; humans benefit only through interactions with other humans; humans need humans to build such fortresses and provide for those 2.5 million corporate stockholders, right along with all companies and businesses in general. However, Gekko solely advocates the view of the individual while complete disregarding that of any collaborative effort. This is a red-flag to signal psychological disorders.

"A corporation is a legal entity separate from the persons that form it. It is a legal entity owned by individual stockholders" --Gordon Gekko, Wall Street (Stone)

Let's start with the most apparent, Antisocial Sociopath Disorder. This illustrates absolutely no regard for the concerns of others; people with this affliction will do anything to acquire self-satisfaction and feelings of self-entitlement with no respect for how their actions affect any other person. An antisocial sociopath is completely indifferent to others around him or her. This person operates under a regime completely unfamiliar to social behaviors, including lying, cheating, and stealing. The conduct of these people goes well beyond any social norm of acceptable behavior, and purely in order to get ahead. Personality disorders typically begin in childhood, and then progress over time into rigid personality traits, obstructing social abilities and acceptable functioning when relating to other people. However, everyone can understand and recognize selfish behaviors, even selfish behavioral patterns, but this does not indicate that a person is becoming, has become, or may become an antisocial sociopath; one with this disorder can identify symptoms from childhood. Surely Gordon Gekko carried this affliction from an extremely early age, too.

"Greed is good" (Stone, Wall Street,1987)

Like a puppet, not alcohol but greed in this situation pulls the strings motivating Gordon Gekko to operate by this handicap of a tunnel focus. Yes, this personality disorder is prevalent in alcoholics just as well as what we commonly perceive as spiteful, calculative, and manipulative materialists. Another alcoholic feature shared by Gekko, particularly the greedy antisocial sociopathic feature of this character, rests in his complete lack of self-identification; antisocial sociopaths bring a sense of self-denial of any of this self-absorption. As much a paradox that this seems, due to the self-sacrifice he perceives because of self-denial, Gekko is so consumed in the self that he executes all his decisions with a complete lack of self-identification.

"It's not a question of enough, pal. It's a zero sum game, somebody wins, somebody loses. Money itself isn't lost or made, it's simply transferred from one perception to another"

Applicable Approach: Psychoanalytic Therapy

Clients interested in psychoanalysis must be willing to commit to an intensive and long-term therapy process. The intent of psychoanalytic therapy is to allow access to the unconscious as a source of conflicts and motivations. The therapist uses techniques such as free association (the client reports anything that comes to mind) and dream analysis (the interpretation of the client's dreams) to find commonalities in the client's thoughts and behaviors and to then interpret them in terms of the client's problems.

The treatment process can, at times, become blocked by the client's resistance (their unwillingness to provide information). Transference is a condition in which the client begins to consider their therapist in the same emotional way they would consider a person in their lives, such as a parent or sibling. Working with interpretation, resistance, and transference is sometimes called "working through," a therapeutic technique in which the therapist helps the client better understand their conflicts and how to resolve them (Psychologist 4therapy.com)

Esteemed Quotes to Enhance Identification

Greed is an impetuous and insatiable craving, exceeding what the subject needs and what the object is able and willing to give. Greed aims at possession of all of the goodness that can be extracted from the object, regardless of consequences, perhaps leading to destruction or spoiling of the goodness - but this is incidental, or innocent. Greed is mainly bound up with introjection, while envy is bound up with projection. Indiscriminate idealization can be fueled by greed, since the need to get the best from everywhere interferes with the capacity for selection and discrimination.

It is my view that greediness is a primary state, a basic expression of Self and of desire. But, an intensity of greed can lead to envy. Greediness can exhaust the good object, such that it seems to be withholding, setting up precisely the conditions for envy. The infant has no inkling of the limits of the world, limits of the mother, or the breast. It has no idea that the demands it will make cannot always be met instantly, and in full. A primary task in human development is to temper such demands, through a capacity for concern (Winnicott, 1963).

For the mature ego, greediness and neediness will be a continuing theme. Although, in my experience with clients who are not seriously disturbed, a more common complication is a denial of greediness, sometimes experienced as emptiness. This stems from a conflict with the super-ego. It is not unusual in such cases to uncover damage or vulnerability in some early good object (n.b. Winnicott calls this the locus of concern). This may then be sufficient to result in the client's greediness being denied for fear of exhausting or completely destroying the good object. (Hiles, 2009)