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The Limits of Idealism

When Good Intentions Go Bad

  • Book
  • © 1999

Overview

Authors:
  1. Melvyn L. Fein

    1. Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw

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Part of the book series: Clinical Sociology: Research and Practice (CSRP)

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Table of contents (9 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xiv
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  2. Idealism on Trial

    Pages 1-21

  3. In the Name of Morality

    Pages 23-44

  4. Messianic Stickball

    Pages 45-66

  5. Dreams or Nightmares

    Pages 67-89

  6. Extreme I: Radical Feminism

    Pages 91-122

  7. Extreme II: Radical Civil Rights

    Pages 123-152

  8. Extreme III: Radical Medicalism

    Pages 153-184

  9. Luminosity Blindness

    Pages 185-207

  10. No Respect

    Pages 209-231

  11. Back Matter

    Pages 233-266
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Keywords

About this book

If the truth be known, I am only a partially reformed idealist. In the secret depths of my soul, I still wish to make the world a better place and sometimes fantasize about heroically eradicating its faults. When I encounter its limitations, it is consequently with deep regret and continued surprise. How, I ask myself, is it possible that that which seems so fight can be a chimera? And why, I wonder, aren't people as courageous, smart, or nice as I would like? The pain of realizing these things is sometimes so intense that I want to close my eyes and lose myself in the kinds of daydreams that comforted me as a youngster. One thing is clear, my need to come to grips with my idealism had its origin in a lifetime of naivet6. From the beginning, I wanted to be a "good" person. Often when life was most treacherous, I retreated into a comer from whence I escaped into reveries of moral glory. When I was very young, my faith was in religion. In Hebrew school, I took my lessons seriously and tried to apply them at home. By my teen years, this had been replaced by an allegiance to socialism. In the Brooklyn where I grew up, my teachers and relatives made this seem the natural course. When I reached my twenties, however, and was obliged to confront a series of personal deficiencies, psychotherapy shouldered its way to the fore.

Authors and Affiliations

  • Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw

    Melvyn L. Fein

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