A Criminal History of Mankind Read Free Page B

success as an eye surgeon came late in life. Ohta achieved his sense of ‘belonging-ness’ through community work; he was one of the founders of the Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz - a non-profit-making hospital - and often gave free treatment to patients who could not afford his fees. Frazier was completely unaware of all this. But it would probably have made no difference anyway. He was completely wrapped up in his own little world of narcissism.
    Clearly there are many ways in which human beings can satisfy the narcissistic craving for ‘being first’. Ohta’s was balanced and realistic, and he was therefore a valuable member of the community. Frazier’s was childish and unrealistic, and his crimes did no one any good, least of all himself.

    Maslow’s theory of the hierarchy of needs developed from his observation of monkeys in the Bronx zoo in the mid-1930s. He was at this time puzzling about the relative merits of Freud and Adler: Freud with his view that all neurosis is sexual in origin, Adler with his belief that man’s life is a fight against a feeling of inferiority and that his mainspring is his ‘will to power’. In the Bronx zoo, he was struck by the dominance behaviour of the monkeys and by the non-stop sex. He was puzzled that sexual behaviour seemed so indiscriminate: males mounted females or other males; females mounted other females and even males. There was also a distinct ‘pecking order’, the more dominant monkeys bullying the less dominant. There seemed to be as much evidence for Freud’s theory as for Adler’s. Then, one day, a revelation burst upon Maslow. Monkey sex looked indiscriminate because the more dominant monkeys mounted the less dominant ones, whether male or female. Maslow concluded, therefore, that Adler was right and Freud was wrong - about this matter at least.
    Since dominance behaviour seemed to be the key to monkey psychology, Maslow wondered how far this applied to human beings. He decided to study dominance behaviour in human beings and, since he was a young and heterosexual male, decided that he would prefer to study women rather than men. Besides, he felt that women were usually more honest when it came to talking about their private lives. In 1936, he began a series of interviews with college women; his aim was to find out whether sex and dominance are related. He quickly concluded that they were.
    The women tended to fall into three distinct groups: high dominance, medium dominance and low dominance, the high dominance group being the smallest of the three. High dominance women tended to be promiscuous and to enjoy sex for its own sake -in a manner we tend to regard as distinctly masculine. They were more likely to masturbate, sleep with different men, and have lesbian experiences. Medium dominance women were basically romantics; they might have a strong sex drive, but their sexual experience was usually limited. They were looking for ‘Mr Right’, the kind of man who would bring them flowers and take them out for dinner in restaurants with soft lights and sweet music. Low dominance women seemed actively to dislike sex, or to think of it as an unfortunate necessity for producing children. One low dominance woman with a high sex-drive refused to permit her husband sexual intercourse because she disliked children. Low dominance women tended to be prudes who were shocked at nudity and regarded the male sexual organ as disgusting. (High dominance women thought it beautiful.)
    Their choice of males was dictated by the dominance group. High dominance women liked high dominance males, the kind who would grab them and hurl them on a bed. They seemed to like their lovers to be athletic, rough and unsentimental. Medium dominance women liked kindly, home-loving males, the kind who smoke a pipe and look calm and reflective. They would prefer a romantic male, but were prepared to settle for a hard worker of reliable habits. Low dominance women were distrustful of all males,