Kristina Millas
Professor Cohen
Psychology
February 20, 2012 Frank Gallagher is one of the main characters from the ShowTime series Shameless. The show takes place in the South Lawndale area of Chicago, which is not a neighborhood most would want to live in. He is an unemployed, selfish alcoholic, that occasionally takes drugs and does nothing but collect disability checks and hangout at the local bar. He has terrible personal hygiene; he falls asleep in the street and goes on drinking binges where he does not go home or anywhere to shower for days because of how intoxicated he is. He is the son of Peg Gallagher, a retired meth dealer who is in and out of jail. He used to be married to a woman named Monica, until she abandoned the family years ago. Frank had six children with her: Fiona, Phillip, Ian, Debbie, Carl and Liam. Since the separation of the two, the eldest child, Fiona, looks after the family, financially and emotionally, with the help of her boyfriend, Steve. She takes on the “motherly” role throughout the show. After years of being separated from Monica, Frank develops a relationship with his neighbor Sheila after he discovers how much disability she gets for her agoraphobia. He does not treat Sheila with the respect she deserves, especially putting up with everything that she does; but he does not treat any women right, all that he seems to want from them are sexual relationships. One could describe Frank as a total hypocrite being as most of the time he self-righteously preaches about the political and social problems around him, yet he spends all of his time developing ways to cheat the system and scheme people to make money. He pays extremely little attention to his children; only displaying care when there is something coming out of it that will benefit him. According to Freud, the structure of personality is formed around the id, ego, and superego. The initial structural component and first character in Freud’s explanation of personality is the id. According to Freud, desire comes from the id, located in the expanses of our mind. Our ego, mediates between the id’s demands and reality. The superego is another name for our conscious, which usually comes from a parent or parental figure’s influence. Most people allow the superego and/or ego overpower all initial thoughts and desires (id) and allows us to be morally correct; but in Frank Gallagher’s situation, it is the total opposite. In Frank’s case, “he wants, therefore he is.” In his mind it does not matter what is right or wrong, what hurts other people and what does not etc., he is just so selfish and his urges, impulses, and desires, are so very strong that he does whatever means necessary to satisfy them. Freud states that personality is mostly established by age five, so early experiences play a large role in personality and development and continue to influence behavior later in life. He believes personality also develops through a series of childhood stages during which the “pleasure-seeking” energies of the id become focused on specific sexual areas. During the first stage of development (0-18 months old), the oral stage, the infant’s primary source of interaction occurs through the mouth, so rooting