Crazy things I've read in books

(1) At different points in Western History, sex within marriage has taken on wildly different roles within marriage. At one time, religious leaders composed texts asserting that--because sex was only to be used for the purposes of producing offspring--it was better to have sex with your father or cousins if you were trying to conceive than to have sex with your husband just for pleasure. Eew! How crazy is that? I hope that the people weren't fooled and that only the religious leaders were running around spouting off this wackiness.

(2) So, this isn't a really crazy thing, but it's a really interesting thing that I've been pondering lately. I read it in a book, so I figure that it falls under the domain of this post's title. I'm reading "Psychology's Sanction of Selfishness" which was written by these two incredibly adorable old Psychologists who have visited the bookstore regularly since it opened over 30 years ago. I found one of the Wallachs books in the basement of the library (on a totally cool shelf that automatically moves itself when you push a button). I'm not that far into the book, but I'm already intrigued. An important thesis from the book is that Freudian therapy aims to decrease the SuperEgo's control over the Ego. One way to safely re-phrase those concepts using a concrete example is to say that Freudian psychoanalysts try to make you feel less guilty about doing the same activity if doing that activity is not harmful to you or others and doing so brings you pleasure. The Wallachs argue--if I have gotten this right--that emphasizing selfish motives and praising self-assertion as the end-all goal of "mental health" leaves out the possibility that altruistic behavior may be very healthy for people, indeed.

I just wanted to put this point out into the internet-ether to see whether anyone else had any thoughts about it. Should we be making people less guilty? Is guilt always a bad thing? Being overly-guilty unnecessarily does seem inhibiting and less mentally healthy, but doesn't it help keep people aware of their value lines to experience some guilt or other negative emotion when they cross those lines?

I'd love to hear your thoughts (citizens of the internet), but I'll write more later, when I've read more of the book and collected my thoughts a bit more coherently.

They also wrote some articles about how mainstream research Social Psychology is often built on circular reasoning. I am really excited about reading their article because I definitely recall having that thought when I was a psychology student and hoping for a more in-depth analysis of the issue. Once a philosopher, always a philosopher, I guess . . .