Thanks again for bearing with me on this. I think I’ve now got a much clearer idea of where you’re coming from, and even if we don’t completely agree, I’m not sure we’re all that far apart.
Like you, I suspect that your definition of objectification is probably more common (although, to be honest, I suspect that many people do not have a clear definition in mind when they use the term). I prefer mine because I think it more clearly focuses in on what (from my perspective) is especially problematic: as you allude to, broadening the definition too much can sometimes make it difficult to talk abstractly about anything. (Though actually, I do think some of the begging-related statements that were made after your original comment were getting close to what I would consider problematic anyway.)
That said, it’s worth emphasising that I do not think that all instances of “objectification” (even in my narrower sense of the term) are necessarily problematic: whether they are or not still depends quite crucially on context. In that sense, I would agree with you that a rule against all objectification isn’t sensible. I do however, tend to think that (a) there are some contexts where it quite clearly is a problem; and (b) it’s something we should be careful about in general, even outside the clearly problematic contexts.
ah, great, it seems we have cleared things up. so part of the discussion was really about having a different definition of the term ‘objectification’. I should be more careful in defining such terms before using them...
now, about the ‘non-problematic’ use cases for the term… literally, the term is not necessarily negative at all of course, but maybe we should try to reserve it for negative cases. most of the cases (including most of the once in this discussion) are relatively benign, and i think people should not be too sensitive. And as I said before, things like prejudice and sweeping generalizations can be countered with mere rationalism and pointing to biases, without accusations of ‘objectification’ at all.
Thanks again for bearing with me on this. I think I’ve now got a much clearer idea of where you’re coming from, and even if we don’t completely agree, I’m not sure we’re all that far apart.
Like you, I suspect that your definition of objectification is probably more common (although, to be honest, I suspect that many people do not have a clear definition in mind when they use the term). I prefer mine because I think it more clearly focuses in on what (from my perspective) is especially problematic: as you allude to, broadening the definition too much can sometimes make it difficult to talk abstractly about anything. (Though actually, I do think some of the begging-related statements that were made after your original comment were getting close to what I would consider problematic anyway.)
That said, it’s worth emphasising that I do not think that all instances of “objectification” (even in my narrower sense of the term) are necessarily problematic: whether they are or not still depends quite crucially on context. In that sense, I would agree with you that a rule against all objectification isn’t sensible. I do however, tend to think that (a) there are some contexts where it quite clearly is a problem; and (b) it’s something we should be careful about in general, even outside the clearly problematic contexts.
ah, great, it seems we have cleared things up. so part of the discussion was really about having a different definition of the term ‘objectification’. I should be more careful in defining such terms before using them...
now, about the ‘non-problematic’ use cases for the term… literally, the term is not necessarily negative at all of course, but maybe we should try to reserve it for negative cases. most of the cases (including most of the once in this discussion) are relatively benign, and i think people should not be too sensitive. And as I said before, things like prejudice and sweeping generalizations can be countered with mere rationalism and pointing to biases, without accusations of ‘objectification’ at all.