To start, after reading the primers I would take a gender-neutral variant of Bartky’s definition: sexual objectification occurs when a person’s body or body parts are singled out and separated from him or her as a person, and he or she is viewed primarily as a physical object of sexual desire.
I agree with Szymanski et al. in that sexual objectification of women is widespread. This includes “everyday commonplace” objectification, “immersed forms” like modeling or cheerleading, and “extreme forms” such as rape or sexual harassment. I also agree that the stereotypical standard of women’s physical beauty in the media is narrow and often unattainable. It has been so in this country since the Gibson Girls if not earlier. I didn’t bother checking their citations for those claims. The basic postulate that sexual objectification can contribute to a number of psychological disorders is mostly agreeable to me, although I am bound to be unsatisfied with the methodology of their citations (it is admitted that most of them use “convenience samples of White, heterosexual, upper middle class, undergraduate women”).
I don’t agree with their proposed criteria for a so-called sexually objectifying environment. They list five core criteria (Szymanski et al, 20-21):
[LIST=a][li]traditional gender roles exist[/li][li]a high probability of male contact exists (physically speaking, a male-dominated environment)[/li][li]women typically hold less power than men in that environment[/li][li]a high degree of attention is drawn to sexual/physical attributes of women’s bodies, and[/li][li]there is the approval and acknowledgement of male gaze[/LIST][/li]Of these I would throw out all except (a) and (d), then remove gender-specific references. As a counterexample, a group of schoolgirls at an all-girl school could conceivably constitute a sexually objectifying environment, despite the notable absence of males. The girls might bring sexism from home or other environments, and perpetuate the objectification on school grounds.
Hopping over to philosophy, I have more than a few issues with Kantian sexual objectification. Particularly, I do not think the act of sex itself dehumanizes a person; it is possible and hopefully common to have sex without treating one’s partner as a mere object of sexual desire. Nor do I believe women necessarily lose their humanity if they freely choose to become prostitutes or concubines (acknowledging that such a free choice is almost certainly extremely rare); nor do I believe that prostitutes are necessarily to blame for their objectification.
I also have many disagreements with MacKinnon, starting with her definition of gender. I can understand and accept the distinction between gender and biological sex. I do not subscribe to the redefinition of the male gender as the objectifier of females, nor of the female gender as she who is objectified by males; surely it must be possible for a male (gender) to respect a female (gender). Using MacKinnon’s definition of gender, advocating for a world without sexual objectification is advocating for a world without gender. I am not willing to bend language to that extent. Personally I would rather think of females as those who for the most part act typical of the female sex, and males as those who for the most part act typical of the male sex. Gender identity is like racial identity: to me, an African American or (American) black is a person who for the most part acts typical of Americans descended from Africans. I consider a person’s self-identification to be the single most important and accessible “act” in determining race or gender, but self-identification is only one factor.
Perhaps the typical male objectifies females, but there is a lot more to being a male and it is quite possible to do so without objectifying females. Neither would I say being objectified directly determines one’s gender: if one behaves like a biological male but is sexually objectified by others, he is still a male. There is a feedback loop in that being objectified can influence one’s behavior, but that influence is indirect (even if pervasive and substantial). I do not argue that gender differences in opportunity or outcome are justified by existing societal feedback. But it does not necessarily hold that objectification causes gender. This is all a dispute of terminology.
I do agree with parts of what she calls “dominance” theory, especially as it applies to race. I just would use dominant and subordinate instead of redefining male and female, because ultimately, there are differences in biology between the sexes that produce inequality under a “difference” theory. As I said above, it’s a terminology issue, but it took me a good hour and more than a few double-takes to get past the terminology and understand her dominance argument. Critically, I cannot identify this theory with legal egalitarianism, which would be the difference approach; thus, I see a contradiction between dominance theory and the equal rights amendment. That makes for a major contradiction in MacKinnon’s position.
More substantially I do not fully agree with her views on sexuality and pornography. While I agree that sexual violence can in fact be sex to some, I do not generalize this phenomena to all males. Personally I think violence is incredibly un-sexy. I think sexual dominance/subordination is un-sexy. I don’t think it is unheard of to think of non-violent and respectful sex as sexy. She didn’t have any cites for her claims that men by and large think it’s sexy to dehumanize and objectify women. I tried looking up some statistics but lost heart (it seems every press release on sexual desires makes some sort of conclusion that isn’t supported by the underlying survey). Anyways, my gut feeling is that a good number of people prefer respectful sex, myself included. We don’t fit anywhere in MacKinnon’s framework of sexuality, and therefore I refute its validity.
Having rejected the above framework of sexuality it does not follow that all pornography must depict violence or sexual dominance, although I cannot deny that some or possibly most does. The pornography which depicts respectful sex does not propagate the objectification of women as objects to be abused, although such pornography may be a product of it. Therefore a blanket condemnation of pornography as contributing to a cycle of gender inequality and objectification in other settings is not in order. Nevertheless, I agree that pornography by definition constitutes sexual objectification. Whether that objectification constitutes a harm to the actress’s humanity depends on the particulars.
I do not subscribe to Dworkin’s idea that the woman’s humanity is injured when a man watches her pornographic media; nor the idea that sexual objectification necessarily causes harm (though it may usually do so). The media is not itself a person, even if the consumer imagines it to be. Any rights that the woman had over her appearance were forfeited when she consented to the production of the media. Therefore the mere consumption of pornographic media, which entails objectification of a woman’s image, does not constitute direct harm to the woman herself…
Unless she didn’t truly consent. I have no doubts that some pornographic actresses are basically sex slaves. This is one of the reasons I do not watch pornography. I do think that is a problem and I could support more regulation of the pornographic and prostitution industries, and taxes to pay for such regulation. Perhaps decriminalization of prostitution, a law requiring written consent to appear in a commercially distributed pornographic film (and automatic injunctions unless such consent is produced upon victim request), support for unions, and a fast-track for restraining and protective orders and actions against pimps. I would confiscate and destroy pornographic materials depicting nonconsenting women. There are concerns about truly destitute women (I am not assuming poverty is their fault) who feel it is necessary to prostitute themselves, and I don’t have an answer for that right now. Such women might find themselves made into sex slaves, but not all pornography is as evil as 1972’s Deep Throat. There are today a number of amateur exhibitionists and professional pornographic actors/actresses who are not sex slaves and enjoy what they do. I’ve heard professionals give interviews on the radio and in lobby-room magazines. They often speak out against sexual violence and how they have and continue to work hard to defend human rights in the pornographic industry. I believe it.
Then there is pornography which depicts women (or men) enjoying pain or humiliation. In these pictures the sex act being shown is itself sexual objectification. That vile pornography which shows actual rape is beyond contempt. Pornographic media depicting imagined rape or humiliation is untasteful in my opinion, but I guess some people are into it. Remember the furor over 50 Shades of Grey?
Some people say that such imagined violence carries over into the real world. I don’t know about that one. I couldn’t access Assiter or Langton’s papers, but I would like to see their rationale (and possibly citations) behind such a claim. Most adults recognize that violence on the cinema screen does not make it OK to commit violent acts in real life. Similarly, I believe most adults can recognize that pretend rape (consensual) is entirely different than for-real rape. Young children of primary school age may not recognize the distinction between reality and fiction but we don’t show children violent movies. Hopefully we aren’t showing young children violent pornography, either. I sympathize with those who say pornography isn’t a huge influence on men’s sexual objectification of females, compared with other sources such as television media or peer pressure.
I also agree that females can objectify themselves. This is as common-sense to me as males objectifying females. Sometimes it seems to me that diets and plastic surgery are the tight-laced corsets of our day.
Finally I am sympathetic to the possibility that not all sexual objectification is bad. That is not to say all sexual objectification is good; I disagree with that statement. It’s just that it’s not necessarily all bad. I’m not much for evolutionary psychology but thinking of someone’s body as an object for sex could be natural mating strategy. Temporary objectification while actually having sex isn’t necessarily wrong, for example calling for a partner’s body part does not necessarily mean you think they are sub-human, and in the context of immediate intercourse you might be forgiven for thinking of your partner as an object of sex. Even couples inflicting pain and humiliation during sex can do so with love, or so I am told.
~Max
