Civilization and Its Discontents – Sigmund Freud

This month we will be reading:
Civilization and Its Discontents by Sigmund Freud

About
What if unhappiness isn’t a personal failure — but the price of living together?
This is a short (under 100 pages) but powerful book that asks a disturbing question:
Why does modern civilization, built to protect and advance us, so often leave us anxious, guilty, and dissatisfied?

Freud argues that:
* human beings are driven by deep, conflicting impulses
* society requires repression of those impulses
* repression produces guilt, frustration, and psychological suffering
* happiness, as we imagine it, may be structurally impossible

Rather than offering self-help or optimism, Freud offers a clear-eyed psychological diagnosis of modern life — one that still resonates nearly a century later.

Details
We will discuss:
* why we struggle
* why society feels constraining
* why guilt and anxiety persist even in “comfortable” lives
* Is unhappiness an unavoidable cost of civilization?
* Are guilt and conscience socially manufactured?
* Would less repression make us freer — or more destructive?
* How does Freud compare with Buddhism, Stoicism, or modern neuroscience?

Alignment with previous books
book aligns with:
* Schopenhauer Cure by grounding suffering in unfulfilled drives,
* with Why Buddhism is True by showing how craving and repression generate dissatisfaction,
* Sapolsky’s Determined by explaining psychological conflict as the outcome of forces beyond conscious control.