Sigmund Freud — the name pops up in every psychology textbook ever. He’s known as the father of Psychoanalysis, a revolutionary thinker who took a major U-turn from what people were doing back then. While everyone else focused on what we could see –like behaviours and thoughts we’re aware of—Freud went deeper. If we go way deeper, Freud built a whole different world of unconscious thoughts, feelings, and ideas – an idea so thought-provoking.
Sounds heavy? Let's simplify a bit.
According to Freud, the mind is like an iceberg. Yes! The one you see in Antarctica. Let's see the top part, which we can see, it's just a small section of the mind that consists of our conscious thoughts. Just below that is the preconscious—stuff you don’t think of until someone brings it up. But the real mystery lies way below the surface in the unconscious—a massive, dark space full of memories, fears, and desires you don’t even know you have, but which affect your behaviour.
Freud’s theories are honestly groundbreaking. His take on the mind changed how therapy works, and his influence is still alive in psychology, even if many people argue about how “scientific” he was. That’s where the debate begins: Was Freud a genius, or a fraud who just made things up?
Was he a genius ahead of his time, or a fraud whose theories are merely fiction than fact?
The Genius Side
Freud had his breakthrough with his work on "The Interpretation of Dreams" during the 1900s, where he wrote about how dreams aren't just random things – they have meaning, opening a door towards the deeper unconscious mind. 'Dream Work,' as he said, is an unconscious process to alter the latent meaning of the dream into a manifest content. Now, what's latent and manifest? The latent part of the dream usually consists of the inner conflicts and thoughts, whereas the manifest content is the part that we remember after waking up. In simpler words, our mind is a magician, which changes anything harmful to our psyche into a cute little harmless thing.
He also worked with Josef Breuer, treating women diagnosed with hysteria (a term for unexplained symptoms, mostly in women at the time). That’s when they created something new—free association. In this technique, the patient lies down comfortably and just... talks. The therapist, Freud, would ask questions regarding various topics and ask the client to explain them in detail.
This was one of the earliest methods of self-realisation and understanding the inner thoughts and conflicts of the mind.
This method was a major change in the way we treat patients – rather than looking into the surface symptoms, we are now looking deeper into the mind where the unconscious resides. And it’s still used in different ways today!
Frued divided the mind into Id, Ego and Superego. Id is the instinctual drive, just like, “I like it, I want it, but I don't have money, so I will steal it”. SuperEgo is like, “This is not morally right, I shouldn’t do it” and Ego mediates between the two, “I could have that thing when I have money.” as Freud also introduced the idea of defense mechanisms – things our mind does without us knowing, to protect us from guilt or anxiety. Ever blamed someone else for something you did? That’s projection. Or ignoring something painful? That’s denial. We all do it, and therapists still use these concepts today.
Another fun fact? Freud was one of the first to say that homosexuality isn’t a mental disorder—way ahead of his time.
But Freud didn’t just shape psychology. His ideas slipped into movies, books, art, and everyday phrases, too. Heard someone say “Freudian slip”? That’s him. Dreams with hidden meaning? Him again. The weird theory that boys secretly want to marry their moms (aka Oedipus complex)—yeah, also him.
The Fraud Allegations
If we look into the early life of Freud, we see a distant, almost absent father figure, much older than Freud’s mother and emotionally unavailable. This left Freud with a strong attachment to his mother and a lifelong craving for validation and recognition.
His professional ethics and practices were also questionable. As mentioned in his biography, Freud: The Making of an Illusion by Frederick Crews, Freud once refused to leave town because he feared his patients might get better in his absence, suggesting he depended more on their illness than their recovery. Most of his theories lacked scientific rigour and were based heavily on his interpretations and observations, not actual empirical evidence. He worked mostly with wealthy women, and there are claims that he exaggerated their conditions to keep them dependent on his therapy.
Sounds fishy, right?
This raises a very real question: were Freud’s theories built on fabricated or exaggerated cases, rather than facts?
Now, let’s talk about the addiction. Believe it or not, the father of psychoanalysis had a cocaine addiction. For over 15 years, Freud used and promoted cocaine, even claiming it to be a miraculous cure for various conditions. One tragic example was Ernst Fleischl, a brilliant scientist who was mildly addicted to morphine. Freud, trusting his own belief in cocaine, treated himself with it, only to cause a dual addiction that led to Fleischl’s collapse and eventual death. Still, Freud published the case under a pseudonym and bragged about its success.
According to Crews, Freud even falsified patient records to fit his theories. In a 1896 lecture, he claimed he had cured 18 patients of trauma-related neurosis—but in private letters, he later admitted he hadn’t cured a single one.
And here’s something even more shocking: many of Freud’s ideas weren’t even his. Concepts like sexual repression and bisexuality came from his collaborator, Wilhelm Fliess, yet Freud took full credit without acknowledgement.
He built much of his work around female hysteria, often blaming women’s psychological or physical symptoms on unresolved sexual desires or trauma. When female patients pushed back against these ideas, Freud would ridicule or outright dismiss them. Even his daughter, Anna Freud, distanced herself from many of his core beliefs and went on to build her own theories in child psychology.
Unbelievable, isn’t it?
Conclusion
So, what do you think? Is Freud a genius or a fraud?
Confused right? Looking at both sides of the argument, it is likely to get confusing. Where, on one hand, his groundbreaking works of unconsciousness and on the other hand, his manipulations, allegations, and a lack of scientific puts a questions about his integrity.
Considering all these, let’s come back to the first question… Was he a genius ahead of his time, or a fraud whose theories are merely fiction than fact?
That’s completely your decision. When even today his theories are being studied and credited, we can say some of his works are undeniably thought-provoking. So, love him or hate him, we can’t change the fact that he changed the way we look at the human mind.