Feminist Perspectives on Objectification
This article is composed of six sections that deal with different facets of the concept of objectification in a feminist context. For a definition of what constitutes objectification, refer to Nussbaum’s criteria outlined in the introduction. I will note that I am unclear on whether the sum of these conditions is sufficient for objectification or if one alone is sufficient for objectification. It seems to me that certain criteria are sufficient on their own (instrumentality) but others are not (fungibility). Additionally, Nussbaum’s criteria have been criticized for being too inclusive. If the use of a taxi driver constitutes objectification under her conditions do the criteria for objectification need to be more exclusive?
Kant on Sexuality and Objectification
According to Kant, an individual is objectified when they are lowered to the status of an object. This is a problematic position because it is one that denies the humanity of an individual or treats an individual’s humanity as a means to an end. Kantian humanity is an individual’s rational nature and capacity for rational choice and it is the quality that differentiates humans from animals and inanimate objects. Accordingly, it would seem that Kant believes rationality to be the essence of human nature regardless of gender. To objectify a woman is to ignore a woman’s capacity for rational thought.
Kant feels that monogamous marriages are the only safe spaces for sexual expression where there is no fear of objectification because they guarantee reciprocity in the process of surrender and ownership between the two partners. In this context Kant seems to accept some degree of objectification. Is a sexual relationship in a monogamous marriage truly equitable and why is this form of objectification acceptable?
Kant also believes in affirming the individuals ability for rational choice yet will not morally allow individuals to choose to sell their body. Is this coherent or is prostitution potentially justifiable in the context of Kantian philosophy?
Pornography and Objectification
Catherine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin have famously argued that objectification and resulting gender inequality is primarily created and sustained by the consumption of pornography. They believe that pornography defines the role of women to be sex objects for the consumption of men. Both MacKinnon and Dworkin share Kant’s interpretation of objectification and believe that pornography denies the humanity of women. Additionally problematic is that pornography portrays women as enjoying their objectification, further perpetuating the norm of objectification. There is no way that a woman can freely choose to become a pornographic actress either, as she is forced into this role given the sexual inequality of our society. Do we agree with this claim?
Cameron and Frazer have criticized this claim however. They believe MacKinnon and Dworkin fail to acknowledge the male capacity to interpret pornography as an inaccurate representation of gender dynamics.
Ronald Dworkin also objects to the claim that pornography is the primary cause of objectification. He believes that while pornography certainly objectifies women, it is not the primary obstacle to sexual equality. These obstacles present themselves in every facet of our culture and combating sexual inequality requires a more dramatic societal restructuring.
Feminine Appearance and Objectification
Most heavily featured thinker to comment on objectification and its repercussions in feminine appearance is Sandra Bartky.
By focusing heavily on their appearance, women are treating themselves as objects.
Not incoherent for an individual to be both both objectifier and objectified.
Bartky explains that women are simultaneously objectified by men and objectify themselves. A woman is a like a prisoner in Bentham’s Panopticon prison and therefore need to be physically appealing to men.
Bartky claims that because of the pervasively gendered feminine norms women’s preoccupation with their bodies has become regarded as natural; women have internalized this norm. Therefore it is difficult for women to escape objectification. The result of this claim seems to be that women only care about their bodies because of the influence of male objectification. However, this claim seems pretty strong to me. Do we agree with Bartky? Is a woman’s preoccupation with her body, whether she is proud or ashamed, invariably caused by male objectification?
Objectivity and Objectification
Haslanger and Langton deal extensively with objectivity how the norm of Assumed
Objectivity leads to objectification. We have already discussed, to some degree, Haslanger’s thoughts on the link between objectivity and objectification. Just to recap, Haslanger believes that in attempting to be objective, the objectifier resorts to a norm of aperspectivity, failing to see that his observations are a result of his social position and that he has an impact on the observed circumstances. Because women have become what men want them to be through objectification, the observed regularities in the “nature” of women are not natural at all.
Langton believes that the norm of Assumed Objectivity is problematic and should be rejected because such a norm leads to ideas that are not sufficient for knowledge. The problems are:
1. Assumed Objectivity leads to false beliefs.
2. and Assumed Objectivity leads to true but unjustified beliefs.
In order to meet the sufficient conditions for knowledge, an idea must be both true and justified. The result of the norm Assumed Objectivity, according to Langton, is that when people in a social hierarchy operate under such a norm they make the world conform to their belief rather then conforming their belief to the (natural) world.
The Possibility of Positive Objectification
Several thinkers, namely Sobel and Green, believe that objectification is either benign or positive. While Sobel believes that people are merely objects, Green believes humans are simultaneously objects and “something more than objects.” Sobel seems to question the Kantian emphasis on human “humanity.” Green, however, believes it is only wrong to treat a person as merely means to an end, but that you can morally treat a person as a means to an end if their humanity is still respected. In these ways, the two thinkers support a benign form of objectification.
Nussbaum claims that there are in fact positive forms of objectification such as the ones that take place in an intimate setting, i.e. the using of a lover’s stomach as a pillow. She believes that negative objectification only takes place in the absence of equality, respect and consent.
The Futility of Specifying the Marks and Features of Objectification
Bauer’s claim does not seem strong to me. How can anything be recognized if there are no parameters by which we judge its existence. Is there a way to defend the strength of Bauer’s argument? Or do we feel that it is a fundamentally weak claim?
Hello everyone,
Sorry for my late post.
As concluded, defining objectivity is difficult and perhaps not possible at all.
It is difficult for me to fully believe that women can 100% be perceived as object like, as Haslanger suggests the following,
a.Men view and treat women as objects of male sexual desire;
b.Men desire women to be submissive and object-like and force them to submit;
c.Men believe that women are in fact submissive and object-like;
d.Men believe that women are in fact submissive and object-like by nature.
Is it really possible for one to ever stop seeing women as objects? And further, can objectification stop being conceived of entirely? Men can most likely tell the difference between a blow up doll and a human, thus is there something deeper in this form of objectification?
I take issue with a couple of points set forth in this article Max has chosen for us.
Firstly, I disagree with MacKinnon and Dworkin’s claim that a woman cannot freely choose an occupation as a porn actress, but that the woman in question is merely forced to do so due to stark gender inequalities permeating our culture (Section 2). The porn industry, regardless of one’s feelings about its moral status, is a business. There are many porn actresses who participate in pornography and live comfortable lives because of the financial success the job brings. There are certainly cases of porn actresses who are qualified to hold other jobs, and who do not choose to do so because they enjoy the work and profit of the porn industry more than the alternatives. We live in a capitalist society — therefore, it’s unfit to generalize porn actresses as women who are being forced into that line of work by societal factors. MacKinnon and Dworkin’s claim may work better if they were attacking prostitution, not pornography.
Secondly, I disagree with Kant’s claim that “the solution to sexual objectification is marriage” (Section 2). Can’t we conceive of objectification occurring during sex within marriage? A man (or woman), whether married or not, can still act to objectify their partner. Take abusive marriages, for example. The mere presence of the marriage label and bond does protect all marriages from the existence of objectification within the sexual realm. Marriage is not a fail-safe for objectification. There are plenty of marriages, unfortunately, defined by inequality and abuse. In the end, the marriage bond does not seem to hold much significance to me in terms of the sexual health of a couple’s relationship. I feel that these relationships and dynamics can only properly evaluated on a case by case basis.
Hello everyone,
Glad to join the conversation. Wish I could have joined you guys for class on Monday.
The elimination of pornography as defined by Catharine MacKinnon and Andrea would do very little if anything at all in the fight against gender inequality.
“No doubt mass culture is in various ways an obstacle to sexual equality, but the most popular forms of that culture—the view of women presented in soap operas and commercials, for example—are much greater obstacles to that equality than the dirty films watched by a small minority”
“The disciplinary power that inscribes femininity in the female body is everywhere and it is nowhere; the disciplinarian is everyone and yet no one in particular”
I fully agree with the these two quotes.
Instead of trying to provide a general definition for objectification or identify its origin, we should try and provide an account of how the concept of objectification has developed through the years within our particular society. Perhaps the effects of negative objectification in one culture aren’t as bad as they are in another. Perhaps to us different places on earth seem a lot closer to complete gender inequality than others, but given that people on different continents and countries operate within, at times, radically different conceptual frameworks, we can say very little about how much suffering these foreign victims are actually under.
Given the wide variety of conceptual frameworks and the way every aspect of any society tends to contribute to however much gender inequality there might be, should we localize definitions of negative objectification? Would we localize these definitions using economic categories or geographic ones?
I have two clarifying questions on McKinnon/Dworkin’s views, and then a follow-up comparing their assumptions to Nussbaum’s
1. What is pornography, as Mckinnon and Dworkin define it? Mckinnon defines pornography as “’the graphic sexually explicit subordination of women though pictures or words that also includes women dehumanised as sexual objects, things, or commodities; enjoying pain or humiliation or rape; being tied up, cut up, mutilated, bruised, or physically hurt; in postures of sexual submission or servility or display; reduced to body parts, penetrated by objects or animals, or presented in scenarios of degradation, injury, torture; shown as filthy or inferior; bleeding, bruised, or hurt in a context that makes these conditions sexual’ (MacKinnon 1987, 176)” (Section 2). This definition would seem to exclude the vast majority of pornography. Is this in fact the case? Is “pornography” basically snuff films? Or does the fact that the majority of pornography is made to titillate the male libido qualify it as such? Put simply, would McKinnon and Dworkin describe any video of a man and a woman having sex as pornography?
2. Is all heterosexual sex rape according to McKinnon and Dworkin? The author of the encyclopedia entry writes, “For MacKinnon and Dworkin, all women’s consent to be sexually used by men cannot be true consent under the existing conditions of gender inequality” (Section 2). Is being “sexually used” the same as having sex with a man? Or, if the man is not in it merely for his own pleasure (orgasm), and instead works to make the experience mutually pleasurable, can a woman give consent?
3. Nussbaum’s account of positive objectification seems to depend on the possibility of an equal relationship between male and female sexual partners—if outside of the bedroom, men respect women’s autonomy and subjectivity, then inside of the bedroom, objectification can be pleasurable. Nussbaum gives the example of two characters from Lady Chatterly’s Lover : “Connie and Mellor do not treat each other merely as means for their purposes, according to Nussbaum. Even though they treat each other as tools for sexual pleasure, they generally regard each other as more than that. The two lovers, then, are equal and they treat one another as objects in a way that is consistent with respecting each other as human beings” (Section 5). Is this sort of relationship possible in a world of universal gender inequality? That is, what role do differences in contextual assumptions (i.e., in what sort of world is this relationship taking place?) play in the divergence of Nussbaum and McKinnon/Dworkin’s accounts?
Max,
I was also interested in the sixth section focused on the (upcoming) work of Bauer. It seems to me that Bauer is presenting a rather Kantian epistemology of objectification. For Bauer, objectification is a concept of understanding which allows one to order their experiences in a meaningful way (in this case, the inclusion of “sexual objectification” in one’s worldview lights up the world so as to illuminate the “relevant phenomena” and results in the observation of previously hidden features). It seems that Bauer also suggests that sexual objectification may not be understood fully or usefully in the abstract, but rather only understood a posteriori from within a worldview that incorporates the concept of sexual objectification. Importantly, she would seem to rely on a distinction between the Concept of Sexual Objectification and the phenomena itself.
To suggest an answer to your question, we can recognize sexual objectification only if we employ the Concept. For me, this makes sense. We employ many concepts in our worldview for which we could not offer a fully adequate explanation, or for which our explanations may not be exhaustive. Yet through our use of these Concepts, we can make definitive judgements about the nature of observed phenomena. (For example, I could not offer an exhaustive or adequate definition/explanation of love, yet I can definitively point to its instances.)
However, this discussion raises another question, which I believe you were also worried by: if recognition of sexual objectification requires the employment of the Concept of Sexual Objectification and the Concept is quite obviously not universal, then how can we ever hope to combat the phenomena of sexual objectification if the phenomena is invisible for the non-believers in it (who seem to be in the majority)? Relatedly, how can we ever hope to instill the Concept in those who do not already possess it (and convince them of its importance), if the evidence, which may prompt them to alter their worldview to include the Concept, is invisible to them?
“A woman, according to MacKinnon, becomes comparable to a cup (a thing), and as such she is valued only for how she looks and how she can be used (MacKinnon 1987, 138). Similarly, Dworkin talks about men being the only “human centre” of the world, surrounded by objects for use, including women. A man experiences his power, according to Dworkin, in using objects, both inanimate objects and “persons who are not adult men” (Dworkin 1989, 104).”
There seems to be some equivocation and disagreements among the feminist writers about the status of women in the patriarchal society, specifically as to whether women are viewed as “persons” in the totalizing pornographic mindset. MacKinnon and Kant compare the status of women to that of non-persons (a lemon or a cup), arguing that they are “objectified” in the most literal sense of the term. Dworkin, meanwhile, makes reference to “persons who are not adult men”—that is, presumably, women, who occupy perhaps a devalued but nevertheless “human” position. I raise this issue because I think it is important to call attention to the conceptual difference between not only “men” and “women”, but also “persons” and “non-persons”. Haslanger raises this issue when she quotes Judith Butler, who writes, “In so far as social existence requires an unambiguous gender affinity, it is not possible to exist in a socially meaningful sense outside of established gender norms… If human existence is always gendered existence, then to stray outside of established gender is in some sense to put one’s very existence into question.” In this passage, I believe Butler’s positions is fundamentally in disagreement with MacKinnon’s view of gender. So, where do we, as a society, locate the “human centre”? Is it in the performance of male identity, to the detriment of the female, or is it in the fulfillment of one’s assigned position in the gender binary?
MacKinnon and Dworkin argue that pornography is always negative and causes objectification. They claim that “even if women consent to their being used as mere means for men’s sexual purposes, this is not sufficient to make such use permissible.” The argue that “women’s consent, therefore, is not true consent,” because their options are limited in a patriarchal society and the exchange of money enforces the power dynamic. Furthermore, “all women’s consent to be sexually used by men cannot be true consent under the existing conditions of gender equality.” I think there’s a lot of truth to this, and I agree that harmful power dynamics are everywhere,
However, are they being fair to women and their decision making skills? Are they practicing the same denial of autonomy that is a part of objectification, or is this another example of false consciousness? In a matter that is so personal, such as what makes an individual happy, can what is ‘objectively’ beneficial be so different from what the individual sees as best? Are women so lacking in autonomy that they can never consent? So then, given the later discussion of how objectification may not always be negative, are more extreme cases of objectification (ie prostitution & pornography) always harmful, or can they be chosen freely by a woman in a way that is not harmful?
This article focuses of the effect of objectification on the person objectified. In the Kantian conception, when men objectify women they reduce women to mere tools for the satisfaction of sexual desire, thereby denying the dignity and humanity of women.
I wonder: Would it be helpful to explore more fully the effect of objectification on the objectifier? It seems that in addition to rationality, humans possess an ability or potential ability to recognize and respect the dignity, agency, and autonomy of others. Therefore, when a man objectifies a woman, he denies not only the woman’s humanity but his own humanity also. Perhaps this could motivate positive change, if men were to realize that objectification harms themselves as well as the women they objectify.
1.
“The other relationship in which objectification is, for Kant, clearly present is concubinage. According to Kant, concubinage is the non-commodified sexual relationship between a man and more than one woman (the concubines). Kant takes concubinage to be a purely sexual relationship in which all parties aim at the satisfaction of their sexual desires (Kant Lectures on Ethics, 166). The inequality that is involved in this relationship makes it problematic. Kant explains that “the woman surrenders her sex completely to the man, but the man does not completely surrender his sex to the woman” (Kant Lectures on Ethics, 169). Since body and self are for Kant inseparable and together they constitute the person, in surrendering her body (her sex) exclusively to her male partner, the woman surrenders her whole person to the man, allowing him to possess it. The man, by contrast, who has more than one sexual partner, does not exclusively surrender himself to the woman, and so he does not allow her to possess his person. In allowing her male partner to possess her person, without herself being able to similarly possess his person, Kant believes that eventually the concubine (and this also applies to the woman in any other polygamous relationship, including polygamous marriage) loses her person and is made ‘into a thing’ (Kant Lectures on Ethics, 166).”
I strongly disagree with Kant on this matter. It seems to me that the problem is not to “surrender” oneself to only one person, but the concept of “surrender” itself. Marriage would only hide the problem but not solve it. What, according to Kant, makes objectification within monogamous relationship okay again?
2. I have a question regarding feminists’ objection to pornography. When they regard pornography as the main cause of objectification, do they mean pornography literally or symbolically? Is it the materialization of sexuality more broadly?
3. I thought about the concept of Assumed Objectivity some more when I was reading the SEP article. When Haslanger said that Assumed Objectivity is the norm of objectivity, is she also ASSUMING that what she observed is the “genuine” regularity? In other words, it seems to me that Haslanger only takes more of a descriptive definition of objectivity, not a normative one?
end of 3 —
The fact that men too face pressure to look a certain way, and engage in constant efforts to improve their appearance, however, is not on its own sufficient to show that women’s (and men’s) preoccupation with appearance is not objectifying. According to Saul, “The increasing pressure on men to conform to unattainable standards of beauty is far from a sign of progress: it is, instead, a sign that the problem has grown” (Saul 2003, 168).
If we can conceive of men having to alter their appearances, and to see images of idealized/unattainable selves in magazines, TV shows, women’s discourse, even pornography, then surely this too is a form of objectification. I don’t see why it is a sign of the same ‘problem’ growing if men too become objectified under an often but not exclusively female gaze? If objectification is bad because of the gender dynamics it reinforces, then why would the objectification of ‘men’ be the same bad?
For Kant, humanity involves not being “treated merely as a means, but always at the same time as an end. Objectification, for Kant, involves the lowering of a person, a being with humanity, to the status of an object”–one without humanity. The SEP article describes Kant’s views on objectification as it occurs through sexual relationships. Based on Kant’s definition of objectification, however, it seems that there is a much wider variety of actions that could potentially cause a person to become objectified. For example, could we not say that a waiter at a café is “treated merely as a means” towards the services he provides rather than as an end in himself? In fact, couldn’t we claim this about any human being who provides a service in exchange for material profit, even if the service does not involve sexual gratification? If so, could we not then claim that a waiter gives up his humanity by being used as a tool and is therefore objectified? I am curious as to why Kant focuses specifically on sex when he discusses objectification, especially when his definition of objectification seems so broad.