APsA-lutely Not!

Why you should really come to P-HOLE's first Counter-Talk on June 13th

You can register here!

As regular readers know, I am a longtime advocate for the abolition of psychoanalytic institutes as we know them, and for boycotting and divesting from legacy psychoanalytic institutions that refuse to get with the times. This position is, to my delight, gaining ever more traction. We see that many institutes are struggling to fill training cohorts; that people are increasingly heeding principled calls to boycott the International Psychoanalytic Association and their affiliated institutes; that engagement with traditional psychoanalytic institutions is waning, but quick.

This is a well-deserved state of affairs, and not exactly new—The American Psychoanalytic Association (APsA) has been forecasting its own demise for decades, and keeps doing hilarious market research and propagandizing to try to keep itself on life support. Still, as the number of psychoanalytic intellectuals and clinicians refusing to prop them up increases, so does their sense of urgency.

The most recent response to this is APsA’s annual Summer Symposium: Reimagining Engagement with Psychoanalytic Institutions. The advertisement reads as follows—

This roundtable discussion is designed for psychoanalysts, psychoanalytic psychotherapists, candidates and trainees, and interdisciplinary scholars of psychoanalysis. The roundtable examines declining engagement with psychoanalytic institutes, including financial barriers, training experiences, the changing and/or unclear mission of psychoanalytic organizations/institutes, generational differences, and institute culture. Six panelists from different institutes, career stages, and theoretical orientations will discuss how institutional participation supports clinical development, professional identity, and community, as well as the factors that discourage involvement. Attention will be given to issues of diversity, belonging, clinician burnout, and the relevance of institutional life to current practice. The discussion will include both local institutes and national organizations and will identify practical approaches to strengthen participation and improve institutional relevance.

This is an infomercial disguised as an academic event. The premise is that these panelists—all six of them—will explain why life in institutes is really good and worth it, despite all the problems. “Strengthen participation and improve institutional relevance” is code for “get more people in to pay dues to keep us from going under.”

Notice that the critiques of psychoanalytic institutions authored by people like me and my numerous colleagues are bypassed? They gesture at the problems, but the event’s stated position is that participation is still the way to go, still super worth it. No one is being asked to present the case for divestment, or take seriously that investment in these institutions is a bad idea in the final analysis; none of these panelists, who are surely all lovely and smart people, are established voices for divestment, nor outsiders to APsA. This is part of an institutional pattern—as I have found in my research, APsA has been making plays like this for decades, and they keep failing.

Being, as ever, a stroppy little minx, I wrote to the Summer Symposium’s chair:

Dear Jane,

I hope you’re enjoying our Western Mass spring/summer! Asparagus, rhubarb, Tanglewood, etc.

This is a bit of an awkward e-mail to write. I just got the ad for your APsA summer symposium, and I was struck by the fact that it seems to recapitulate a tendency I have observed from APsA again and again--to exclude its critics, even as it tries to act as though the criticisms we have raised have already been solved or were unfounded, and news of the solution/non-issue needs to be widely disseminated in order to bring in more paying customers. I have a section about this in my forthcoming book, which I’d be open to sharing with you privately if it’s of interest.

As you may know, my basic position is that APsA should be abolished, but even if one does not take that maximalist view, institutions need to be able to deal with their sincere critics directly. I think it would be very interesting for you to actually invite me, or someone from this abolitionist school of thought, to participate in a program such as this, to see how your panelists (who are all fairly staunch institutionalists, and none of whom have authored the kind of critical work that clearly precipitated this event) would respond to the actual substance of the critique that is leading people to divest from psychoanalytic institutions. And not the version of the critique that won’t upset APsA stalwarts, or the messenger that they would see as basically respectable--the real plague, as it were.

I was not raised to invite myself to things, so this is rather mortifying for me! Politesse, professionalism, old habits die hard. On principle I think it’s important, though. Loads of us have divested from these institutions precisely because of this tendency to evade criticism, with a hard-to-miss profit motive hanging over the conversation.

Anyhow. I’m around on June 13th. Happy to help.

Cheers,

Carter

Before too long, I had my reply:

Dear Carter,

Thank you for your offer and for sharing your perspective. At this point our program is all set.

Best,

Jane

So, after taking a minute to savor the exquisiteness of having my point so pitch-perfectly proven, I dropped a line to the folks at P-HOLE, who suggested running a Counter-Talk.

P-HOLE’s Counter-Talk initiative involves running counter-programming to improve upon, and frankly protest, events by legacy psychoanalytic institutions that are doing something messed up. When they refuse to take criticisms seriously, like when they invited noted transphobic pseudoscientists to give prestigious lectures, P-HOLE can host events that do something more sophisticated, provocative, and constructive.

So! I’ll be kicking off this Counter-Talk initiative with the fabulous Kristen Miller, hosted by P-HOLE’s Adrian Sanchez (a gem). I’ll be reading excerpts of my book manuscript that document how APsA tries to use propaganda to save its own bacon, and we’ll explore the substance of the case for divesting from psychoanalytic institutions. We’ll have lots of time for audience participation! June 13th, 12-2 EST.

I really hope you’ll come, for a few reasons. One: it will irritate the bejeezus out of APsA, which is very amusing to me. Two: donations from the event will flow to the beloved Asian American Center for Psychoanalysis, the realest ones around. Three: I know I can be a bit of a broken record about institutes, but the research I’m presenting here has never been shared before, and it’s really really striking and hilarious and disturbing—strong tea.

See you there!