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What a wonderfully Kantian exchange, thank you for sharing that. Even if what she says is true, though it seems that there are instance of treating people as ob

What a wonderfully Kantian exchange, thank you for sharing that. Even if what she says is true, though it seems that there are instance of treating people as objects which some (most?) people do not consider to be harmful, at least in this society - employing someone under a wage, for instance (covered by Frederic Lordon in his great book on Marx and Spinoza) or pornography which some commentators deem to be identical to the objectification of the people it portrays (particularly women). Ironically, though, many thins which are harmful actually depend on recognizing (thinking) of people as human, and then denying that humanity - there must be something to deny. An insult comparing someone to dirt is only ever said because they recognize firstly that the person isn't dirt - and that's why it's effective. The principle is same with objectification. In pornography, for example, it's only appealing because the viewers know on some level that the people portrayed are more than objects, and the degradation they experience is part of the show, precisely what makes it so titillating.

hprotagonist 8y ago
I was thinking more of Martin Buber. What little I recall of Kant right now is probably on point, though -- as i recall, he was on board with "humans have intrinsic worth". "treating people as things" doesn't necessarily mean that you believe that people _are_ things -- as you note, a willful blurring of that line in the knowledge (even subliminal knowledge) that you're acting in bad faith is, perhaps, where "it" starts in the first place. To your examples: Employing people does not necessarily constitute treating them as things; many sharp critiques of the labor market basically center around the idea that treating your employees as things is both unnecessary and harmful. I don't necessarily agree that pornography is obligate depersonalization -- c.f. The Stranger's HUMP fest, for example, which seems pretty person-ful to me.
- claudiawerner 8y ago
  With regards to employment, I see there being a continual trend towards making people as fungible as money when it comes to running an efficient business, this fungibility is predicted by the fact that when it comes to money, a form of wealth in capitalist society, labour is its source, and the most "rational" decisions thrift-wise are made with regard to only labour in abstract rather than concrete form. The theory of commodity fethishism plays a role in this too - but yes, in these theories the labour is objectified but the worker is not. As much as it is not necessary to treat the worker as a human as opposed to a machine you turn on during the time you are allowed to rent it, the necessity can often become quickly apparent even to the most sympathetic employer[0]. I think the point with porn is similar to the previous one, in the sense that porn which resists commodification is often the sort in which the people portrayed are doing it for their own sake as much as they are some kind of artistry. The critique of pornography is framed around porn defined as a kind of inequality while the rest could be better termed erotica. I don't personally think the distinction holds up to much scrutiny (there's half on an entry in SEP going over this issue) but it's reasonable to say that objectification is common in industrial pornography in particular - which despite its diversity of themes tend to boil down to this rather simple idea. [0] "To prevent possible misunderstanding, a word. I paint the capitalist and the landlord in no sense couleur de rose [i.e., seen through rose-tinted glasses]. But here individuals are dealt with only in so far as they are the personifications of economic categories, embodiments of particular class-relations and class-interests. My standpoint, from which the evolution of the economic formation of society is viewed as a process of natural history, can less than any other make the individual responsible for relations whose creature he socially remains, however much he may subjectively raise himself above them." (Karl Marx, preface to the first German edition of Capital)

hprotagonist 8y ago

I was thinking more of Martin Buber. What little I recall of Kant right now is probably on point, though -- as i recall, he was on board with "humans have intrinsic worth". "treating people as things" doesn't necessarily mean that you believe that people _are_ things -- as you note, a willful blurring of that line in the knowledge (even subliminal knowledge) that you're acting in bad faith is, perhaps, where "it" starts in the first place. To your examples: Employing people does not necessarily constitute treating them as things; many sharp critiques of the labor market basically center around the idea that treating your employees as things is both unnecessary and harmful. I don't necessarily agree that pornography is obligate depersonalization -- c.f. The Stranger's HUMP fest, for example, which seems pretty person-ful to me.

claudiawerner 8y ago
With regards to employment, I see there being a continual trend towards making people as fungible as money when it comes to running an efficient business, this fungibility is predicted by the fact that when it comes to money, a form of wealth in capitalist society, labour is its source, and the most "rational" decisions thrift-wise are made with regard to only labour in abstract rather than concrete form. The theory of commodity fethishism plays a role in this too - but yes, in these theories the labour is objectified but the worker is not. As much as it is not necessary to treat the worker as a human as opposed to a machine you turn on during the time you are allowed to rent it, the necessity can often become quickly apparent even to the most sympathetic employer[0]. I think the point with porn is similar to the previous one, in the sense that porn which resists commodification is often the sort in which the people portrayed are doing it for their own sake as much as they are some kind of artistry. The critique of pornography is framed around porn defined as a kind of inequality while the rest could be better termed erotica. I don't personally think the distinction holds up to much scrutiny (there's half on an entry in SEP going over this issue) but it's reasonable to say that objectification is common in industrial pornography in particular - which despite its diversity of themes tend to boil down to this rather simple idea. [0] "To prevent possible misunderstanding, a word. I paint the capitalist and the landlord in no sense couleur de rose [i.e., seen through rose-tinted glasses]. But here individuals are dealt with only in so far as they are the personifications of economic categories, embodiments of particular class-relations and class-interests. My standpoint, from which the evolution of the economic formation of society is viewed as a process of natural history, can less than any other make the individual responsible for relations whose creature he socially remains, however much he may subjectively raise himself above them." (Karl Marx, preface to the first German edition of Capital)