Real or Imaginary Hypophallism: A Cause of Inferiority Feelings and Morbid Sexual Jealousy

Abstract

Sexual jealousy is both an attitude of mind and an emotional state: the latter resulting from a blending of emotions aroused by an affront to the instincts of mating, self-assertion and acquisition. Sexual jealousy is of particular interest to the psychiatrist, since in its morbid manifestations it destroys marital harmony (Gillard, 1896) and may lead to homicide or suicide (Mowat, 1966). Sexual jealousy may be regarded as a normal reaction but it is abnormal when: (a) the jealous person is haunted by what the ‘man in the street’ would recognize as a groundless conviction that his or her sexual partner has been, or will be, unfaithful; or (b) jealousy engendered by actual infidelity is of such intensity as to render the person dangerously aggressive. Examples of the second category are Ruth Ellis, who shot dead her unfaithful lover; and Pilar Garcia-Compte, who killed her husband after he had refused to break with his mistress.