Love, Lust, and Sex III

Readings

Texts

Quiz Questions

What are three of the forms of identification Nussbaum identifies?
How does Blackburn respond to the charge that lust necessarily involves objectification?
Why is objectification qua fungibility problematic for Blackburn's account of lust?

Synopsis

Today we concluded our discussion of Blackburn's attempt at rescuing lust from the horrors of panicked Christians by noting that it is not just panicked Christians who might find lust, suitably understood in terms of Hobbesian Unity, as problematic. For in desiring someone else, are we not thereby taking them out to be an object of desire?

Since objectification comes up later in the course when we consider promiscuity, sexual entertainment, prostitution, and, especially, pornography, I included in our readings Lina Papadaki's, "What is Objectification?" as background reading and from which we may draw for this and later discussions.

For this discussion, we take special note of Nussbaum's analysis of objectification, which she sees as an ambiguous term containing many related yet distinct concepts. Quoting Papadaki,

Nussbaum explains that the following seven notions are involved in the idea of objectification:
Instrumentality: The objectifier treats the object as a tool for his or her purposes.
Denial of autonomy: The objectifier treats the object as lacking in autonomy and self-determination.
Inertness: The objectifier treats the object as lacking in agency, and perhaps also in activity.
Fungibility: The objectifier treats the object as interchangeable (a) with other objects of the same type, and/or (b) with objects of other types.
Violability: The objectifier treats the object as lacking in boundary-integrity, as something that it is permissible to break up, smash, break into.
Ownership: The objectifier treats the object as something that is owned by another, can be bought or sold, etc.
Denial of subjectivity: The objectifier treats the object as something whose experiences and feelings (if any) need not be taken into account.
A person, according to Nussbaum, is seen and/or treated as an object, when they are seen and/or treated in one or more of the seven ways on her list. Instrumentality, then, which is the core notion of Kant/MacKinnon/Dworkin’s conception of objectification, is, as Nussbaum explains, only one of the ways a person can be treated as an object. Objectification, as Nussbaum rightly emphasizes, often involves treatment other than the instrumentalization of a human being.

Blackburn's response is straightforward insofar as instrumentality, denial of autonomy, inertness, violability, ownership, and denial of subjectivity are concerned: None of these senses or modes of objectification are compatible with Hobbesian Unity, and if Hobbesian Unity is indeed the substance of the sexual activities sought for their own sake in the enthusiastic, whole-body, felt desire he has defined as lust, then lust is not problematic, at least regarding those modes of objectification.

Fungibility, Blackburn admits, is different. Unlike love--which, if we follow Frankfurt at least, is ineluctably personal in the sense that the beloved is loved in themselves, without replacement or substitution--lust seems possible, maybe even very likely, with many different people who stand reasonably to be objects of lust--thus the concept of 'having a type'. Consider, for example, the concept of a "hall pass" or the idea of a "celebrity list" otherwise monogamous couples might entertain, acknowledging that their partners may well find themselves lusting after someone else. Thus we see a kind of collision between lust and love emerging from their conceptual analyses. The collision is not a contradiction, of course, yet it is interesting to note that it does seem to reflect ordinary experience, as we discussed.

The relationship between lust and love will continue to occupy us as we move on to discussing the different kinds of sexual relationships people form. When we return from Spring Break, for example, we consider (apropos the very reason for 'Spring Break') 'hooking-up' and promiscuity amid further worries over objectification.

Please note that our Midterm Examination is scheduled for our next meeting: Thursday, 3/5. I am happy to entertain any questions you might have, but my office hours are limited due to term paper conferences with students in Minds and Machines.