These are comments by pwlsax and Mark Greene on the post “Why I Hate Porn: One Man’s View“.
pwlsax said:
“I’d call it embodiment, not objectification. Objectification is seeing and feeling a human as a nonhuman – a tool/hole, a thing done to, a thing beneath you. If consensual, cool, but in a healthy relationship, it’s finally a pose.
“Embodiment is seeing and feeling someone (or yourself) as a fully physical human. I think it helps if you’re into the whole body, including things like hair, eyes, voice, scent, motion. That for me is peak arousal.
“Finally, guys turn off porn because you can’t lie holding a video after you’re done.”
Mark Greene responded:
“I agree. The key here is that such moments MUST be consensual or they can be damaging. If my wife were to say to me, ‘HUSBAND, I’m in the mood for a cowboy tonight’ and then hand me a cowboy hat and a bandana, I would consider that objectifying me. It would be, as you say, striking a pose. And I would be happy to provide her that relational ‘pose candy’ because I know that our relationship doesn’t begin and end with that.
“The moment of objectification can be good or bad depending on the CONTEXT of the relationship in which it occurs and the degree to which those being objectified are happy to collaborate in the moment. I realize the word objectifying is a bad word in many circles. But I don’t view it as such. To me it is a neural term or idea. It can be a bad thing or a good thing depending on context.”
More Comments of the Day
Photo credit: Flickr / jakeprzespo
I wish people would understand the psychological concept of objectification better before discussing it. It comes from psychoanalytic theories and the idea is that there is always a subject (oneself) and objects (everyone else). That is, whenever we interact with others, we are interacting with our mental idea of that person (our “object”). Our mental object can be simple or complex. It is made up of our psychological needs and desires. Viewing someone as a “sex object” means relating to them solely in terms of our sexual needs. Ideally we will be psychologically healthy enough to have relationships with people… Read more »
I would like to suggest that the psychoanalytic theoretical frame for validating or invalidating meaning in language is up for debate on many levels. There is HUGE debate within the psychoanalytic community about language and who is privileged to define what words mean. Saying a word has a specific meaning empowers the agenda of the person who is privileged (in a position of power) to define that term. Objectification as defined by particular groups can have very negative connotations. Connotations I prefer not to abdicate to. I prefer to think its up to us as people in conversation to decide… Read more »