Peenie Wallie

In "Guns and Public Health: Epidemic of Violence or Pandemic of Propaganda?" (1995), Don Kates and his co-authors wrote:

Anti-gun health advocates seem blind or unconcerned about the danger that their emotions may preclude rational evaluation of gun ownership. Psychiatrist Emmanuel Tanay, who admits that he loathes guns to the point of being unable to look upon or touch them with equanimity, asserts that gun ownership betokens sexual immaturity or neuroticism.[49] As evidence of this, Dr. Tanay asserts that gun owners actually "handle ... with obvious pleasure" these horrid objects which so repulse him, that collectors "look after" their collections, and that owners "clean, polish and pamper" their guns.[50] "The owner's overvaluation of his gun's worth is an indication of its libidinal value to him."[51]

Further, Dr. Tanay invokes Freud's purported view of the sexual significance of firearms in the interpretation of dreams.[52] Invoking Freud is particularly ironic because Freud's comments were not directed at gun ownership. Insofar as Freud addressed the matter at all, he seems to have equated fear and loathing of guns with sexual immaturity and neuroticism.[53] We are emphatically not endorsing Freud's view as either applicable to Dr. Tanay or explanatory of his views. Our concern is with the effect fear and loathing of guns has on the intellect, not on the libido. The effect on Dr. Tanay is that he cannot recognize how gun collectors' tastes might differ from his own or how they might comprehend passages from Freud; in fact, he is unable to read them without imposing a meaning almost opposite of what they actually say.

Kates citation was Sigmund Freud & D. E. Oppenheim, Dreams in Folklore 33 (1958).

I spent a few days going through several libraries, due to a bet I had with somebody about Freud's position. I don't think I ever found a copy of Dreams in Folklore. However, I did go through A General Introduction to Psychoanalysis, another book often cited as the source of that quote. I didn't find any reference to a "fear of weapons" in General Introduction.

Even a discussion about that quote on TheHighRoad.org, a firearms related forum site, didn't produce any definitive answer.

I have no idea what Freud's position on weapons was, nor do I really care (besides, Fred is much more interesting). But until I find a primary source, or somebody I trust verifies it, I'll have to file it away as bogus gun-control quote.

Maybe the attention given to the supposed-Freud quote by Instapundit will finally settle this matter once and for all.

UPDATE (evening of April 23): And it has.

I never imagined that the ramblings of a week I wasted 9 years ago would get a link from the Blogfather himself. You can read his findings at http://instapundit.com/archives2/004388.php .

The bad news is I owe somebody $100.