Their claims are stereotypes not psychoanalysis

(Daniel, Political thought AND Psychology, Psych@Duquesne, Critical Theory and Psychoanalysis: From the Frankfurt School to Contemporary Critique ed. Mills and Burston)

Given the circumstances in which critical theory arose, the fact that some critical race theory practitioners claim a sense of kinship or continuity between critical theory and critical race theory calls for careful reflection. And here, I confess, I advise caution. Why? First, because the term ​“​critical theory​”​ is used too broadly nowadays to include thinkers as disparate as Antonio Gramsci and Jacques Derrida, both quite famous, but neither of whom were connected to the Frankfurt School for Social Research. Another reason to be cautious in drawing comparisons between critical theory and critical race theory is that the latter is deeply influenced by postmodernism, while critical theorists like Leo Lowenthal and Jürgen Habermas were sharply critical of postmodernism (Lowenthal, 1987; Jeffries, 2016). Finally, on a more personal note, my latest book, titled Anti-Semitism and Analytical Psychology: Jung, Politics and Culture (Burston, 2021), takes an unsparing look at C. G. Jung’s invidious comparisons between the ​“​Aryan unconscious​”​ and the ​“​Jewish unconscious.​”​ As I pondered Jung’s harmful declarations on this score, it became quite evident to me that anyone who ventures to speculate about the ​“​collective unconscious​”​ of another ​“​race​”​ or racialized group is in danger of succumbing to and/or perpetuating stereotypes and caricatures that can be harmful, while remaining blissfully unaware that they are doing so (see e.g., Burston, 2021, Chapter 3). So while critical race theory got off to a promising start in relation to psychoanalysis, I am deeply dismayed by the remarks of some contemporary psychoanalysts who speculate about the ​“​White mind​”​ or the ​“​White unconscious,​”​ who veer sharply into dangerous territory.