Is This Empowerment, Or Objectification?
This is a response to the article:
Thoughts On Women Oppression And Porn
It offers a female feminist's perspective on the afformentioned.
Opening the article, author @sean-king leads in by defining and making notes on evolutionary #psychology (the idea that, useful mental and psychological traits—such as memory, perception, or language—as adaptations, i.e., as the functional products of natural selection). Highlighting that women (evolutionarily) hold sexual power.
He then begs the question: “Given this birthright evolutionary power over men's psyches, women could easily rule the world. But...they don't. Why?”
The answer is simple: we often don’t hold the power.
Not all women (people) want to be empowered sexually, so the ideal that it is “woman’s birthright” to hold sexual power is a sexist stereotype. Implying that (through a born-male, heteronormative perception) women are purely sexual influencing beings is a primitive ideal that helps uphold a patriarchal society. It is borderline Freudian.
Evolutionarily speaking, humans are capable of developing different behaviours genetically and adaptively. People are slowly realizing that we aren’t just monkeys, purely motivated by mating and hetero reproduction. This is evolution: the part of the mind that built civilizations, art, invented technology, and questioned society.
Is This Empowerment, Or Objectification?
Selling sex appeal is indeed a guilty culprit of objectification and dehumanization, but it’s not always repressing (sexually, socially or economically).
It can be difficult to draw the line between sexual empowerment and objectification, so this might help you understand the difference:
Who has the power?
If the person being subjected has the power, than it is empowerment.
However, if that person has little or no power, they are being objectified.
Ask yourself: Is the person aware and consenting to sexualizing the situation?
If the answer is No, it is most likely objectification.
If the answer is Yes, then it is definitely empowering!
“Do we objectify or dehumanize people when we allow them, without shame or scorn, in fact with praise, to market valuable assets (with their free will and consent)?”
That’s a rhetorical question.
Race, class, gender, or privilege aside; people benefit from empowerment. Sometimes, the empowerment comes from sexual means, and other times, it’s monetary. Most privileged people, feminists, and others alike will agree that sex sells.
Things aren’t as black and white as the author originally questioned, though.
When we have women(people) that are subjected to their quote unquote “inherent sexuality,” without consent, that’s when we have problems like dehumanization and objectification. Gender inequality is a much larger issue than just porn.
Feminism has one goal: to abolish the prejudice of (women) on the basis of sex, and for equal rights politically, socially, and economically.
Throughout the entire article, the author is attempting to explain what is wrong with society's treatment of women: yet simultaneously perpetuating what is wrong with it.
While, yes, it’s good to embrace your sexuality, and #gender: we have to realize that those are two completely separate subjects. Gender inequality shouldn’t have that many parallels to sexuality/sex. Sexualization is one of the underlying causes of gender inequality.
It’s wonderful we are finally starting to see the effects of oppression, and are analyzing our behaviors… but it’s going to take a lot to change society, and even more for us to abolish the true underlying aggressor:
institutionalized #sexism and #discrimination against #women of all ages, races and identifications.
Note that while I do not agree with the evolutionary psychology ideologies stated in the article in question, I do agree that there is a problem with gender discrimination that must be confronted.
I hope you take these responses into consideration when thinking about how we interact and treat women.
I think the judger holds all the power and the judgee holds no power whether they are aware or not. If they're aware, that means they are actively trying to seek approval, which might be even worse.
It's definitely up for interpretation, that's for sure. Obviously there are many factors to consider. I was trying to simplify the idea, in order for it to be more digestible.
Thanks for this. I have a few thoughts and look forward to responding when I can.
Likewise, I am looking forward to your response!
Here are my promised thoughts. Thanks again. https://steemit.com/sex/@sean-king/more-thoughts-on-women-oppression-and-porn
Actually, the patterns objectifying or subjectifying (based on the author's statements about consent) shouldn't be taken as immutable facts as depending on personality, social situation, norm modification, ect, the individual would likely have a shifting perspective on whether they are being objectified or subjectified, so it follows that you may be able to come with an statistical norm for that individual, but you could not find concrete (once and for all time) label for any segment of the population or an individual whose life is in any flux--whether that be socially, personally, or financially. It would be interesting if a study could be done and hammer out the details and get some better data on sexism (both from men and women), personality, social situation, social norms, personal conduct, ect, effect a persons perception of how they are or are not being objectified, or subjectified (though that last term needs some refining AFAICS).
While I agree, I would like to reiterate that both I and @sean-king express in our articles these are personal thoughts and insights. I did not provide any statistics or studies as this is a response motivated by my experience as a woman and how I have observed sexual objectification and gender discrimination.
A greater point is how any experience is objective, so any observation that hinges its truths on subjective observation is bound to be wrong--though truthful to the one making the observation (we believe what we believe but we don't know why we believe it--primal programming engendered by language systems battling for the next data stack to incorporate itself into the psyche)--tried to say all I mean in that statement as we start paying for posts [and editing] after 4 in specified window--I think it's 24 hours, but there are 6 hour intervals that diminish the fee greatly--IIRC.
On the contrary, experiences are subjective. When we are influenced by our feelings and opinions, we are being subjective. That does not mean it is inherently wrong, however. If you take a look objectively we can still see that gender roles and discrimination is something deeply instilled in society-- regardless of my subjective responses.
I would like to also point out that I never stated that I am accounting for the entire female population. This is a female motivated response to a man's opinions on female oppression.
He, nor I, can make concrete statements. We are merely forming out own, subjective opinions.
Not on the contrary, that was exactly what I was pointing out--though I'd go further and say any opinions not grounded with some objective test (such as the algorithm creating a statistical norm) are pointless unless you are trying to out will an opponent in the Judaic God sense of might makes right--most western thought is platonic, so this line of reasoning usually leads no where and some scientific inquiry is needed to make any actionable change within the system. Hope, you follow what I'm saying, as I think you prior statements agree to the subjective versus objective point, though you may feel opinion finding a more useful exercise than I do. I'm very rational, so evidence and results are my bread and butter, preferably served on white bread and without much thought to what it taste like (that was a joke, I think).
You go girl, you can have it all!!
@veralynn i just posted a blog on gender bias, let me know what you think of it. thanks.
https://steemit.com/domestic/@tjpezlo/gender-bias-men-abused
In modern society, people are spending a lot of time on the philosophy in order to be able to control other people and their opinions. One kind of such a philosophy is ethics.
It would be great if people just dared to love and to do anything in spite of ethics and other philosophical views.
I agree! Thank you for such a powerful response.
oh, how exciting. what a good idea.
I also saw that article blow up and I'm glad to see somebody write something substantive about why they were wrong.
When I read the article you are replying to, and he concluded with the idea that 'steemit is great because we can use it for porn' I felt slimy just for reading it...
Thanks for sharing this @veralynn. it's great to see a female's perspective on this.I
enjoyed reading your post, and I love the last paragraph. As men, we really should be thinking about how about we interact and treat women in society.
Damn. Thanks for writing this. I had wanted to write exactly what you did but alas, I got distracted!
"Who has the power?
If the person being subjected has the power, than it is empowerment.
However, if that person has little or no power, they are being objectified."
I have been saying this since DAY 1. When more whales are females, we will start to see some shifting perspectives. I for one would like to see men exploit themselves more, if they are so inclined to do so. This is an area that is completely wide open now on Steemit. I see one of the problems that exist in society: men don't really think of themselves as sexual objects, therefore they cannot really value their inherent sexy gifts. This is because women traditionally have not had power and money to influence their behaviour and actions in a pleasing manner, geared towards the female gaze. When any little shrimp trolls me as a "FEMINIST" I just laugh. I am a cougar. I love men in a way that's unhealthy. If anything, I am a total fantasy addict. An eccentric person. A voyeur. Sick, maybe, but at least I know it.
Couldn't have said it better myself! Thank you so much for the encouragement and insights @stellabelle.
Men are not pursued sexually simply because sperm is plentiful and cheap. Women are pursued sexually simply because eggs are rare and valuable. It has nothing to do with women not have sufficient economic influence to induce men to exploit their sexuality.
That analogy is only good on a biological standpoint, though... people are more motivated by social and psychological factors than they are on an evolutionary basis, in my opinion.
Example:
I pursue men and women. Regardless of my "economic influence," I don't value sperm or eggs, personally, because I don't want to conceive or impregnate a woman.
A lot of people don't fit into that categorization. It sounds trite because there's so much more to people then X and Y.
It's not a matter of "values", it's a matter of instinctual drives. Birds don't "value" flying south in the winter, they just do it instinctually. Humans (on average) SAY that they VALUE monogamy, but instinctually they pursue multiple sex partners. Virtially all psychologists (whether of the evolutionary variety or not) and virtually all scientists agree that humans act mostly as a consequence of unconscious urges and that free will is mostly an illusion. I understand you to disagree with that. That's fine. Just know that the science is against you, so don't cite science to support any of your positions in the future.
https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_dennett_on_our_consciousness?language=en
I don't know how many times I have to say this: I never denied science as a whole.
There are a lot more factors that go into what motivates us besides instinct, as I previously said. If you feel that instinct is your only motivator, not your experiences, then yes, I definitely disagree with that.
It's an overly simplified cop out to excuse bad behavior, and gives people zero accountability for their actions because it's all "unconscious."
We need more of these types of debates in Steem.