Hi, can I ask what you mean by “sexualizing” a body? An adult female body is intrinsically sexualized because it presents sexual characteristics that are intended to be attractive, in line with the function of the species that is, vital autopoiesis: life generates other life, through reproduction.. Likewise, a male body presents characteristics of sexual attraction for its female counterpart. Can we discuss externality, which sex presents more or less visible characteristics? It would be misleading and we would be venturing down arduous paths, probably meaningless (perhaps only anatomically not devoid of meaning). I believe that it’s not adult bodies that are sexualized (since they already are as an essential condition, and it could not be otherwise), but rather that sexual attractiveness is used in different contexts, because the potential is well known. An advertisement is sexualized because it uses (a banal example) a curvy and skimpy woman; a product with pseudo-phallic or soft and welcoming shapes is sexualized (and here we enter into subtle psychological mechanisms); an immature body is sexualized (in that case, yes), but due to problematic and antisocial behavioral deviance; an object is sexualized in common language based on the “strength” that is recognized in it; let’s think of a powerful car, which in slang boys change from “car” to “monster,” a powerful monster, a monster that is clearly masculine; the powerful car does not become a “fiera” (note: in Italian “fiera” means a ferocious beast, a she-wolf, a tiger…).
Let’s take stock, well, I will see if I still can late at night. On the one hand we have Amadeus. You invoke a rather typical image of the male.
The telling quote here is ‘self reliant’ and indeed all throughout history self reliance be it for a person or be it for a country is considered a self evident good. However, in today’s world no one is self reliant anymore. Equally true would be a the sentence: “a man needs to be others reliant”, because to get ahead he will need good relations with others, he needs to be sociable etc. I do not think you would deny that but of interest is what you emphasize, self reliance, master of his own world.
I feel an appeal to basic human behaviour is almost always a cop out. The ideas of what ‘basic human behaviour’ is, changes over time. We used to think that women lacked rationality and we assumed this was a basic feature of the human condition, we think differently now. I do agree with you that there is a material aspect in play here. Men tend to be stronger in the sense of more muscular strength than women. That makes them better at ‘dealing with intrusive other males’, but that these males are intrusive may be a feature of ‘basic human behaviour’. but may also be a feature of social norms. You are a real man when you hunt for women. At least, I think such a cultural norm is in play. If it were different and there were less of such norms, there might be less need for this knight in shiny armour. I do not claim you are wrong, not at all, but as I said, I think it is quite an essentialistic position and as such there is not much more to get into. Yet, seeing how society changes to incorporate all kinds of behaviour we would have thought of as ‘not basic human nature’ just a short while ago, I do not feel like putting my eggs in that basket just yet.
Neither do I think sexualization is inherently wrong. In fact I would like more of it. My problem is the denial of it. On that Amadeus and I seem to agree. I think that basic human condition might well be basic, but it is also permeated by social norms that demand the attitude of protector from men. Where I think this expectation differs from a mere gender role is that men are also sexually ranked on their ability to be protectors. There sexualization comes into play, though the sexual aspect is usually downplayed. “He is kind” or “he is chivalrous”, it is claimed. What is really meant is “I find that horny”. Here I am close to Amadeus’ line of thinking.
Well the judgment whether a certain act of killing qualifies as murder is context dependent, as in any legal judgment, but you are probably not here for a lecture of law.
One thing in important, no definition of muderder can cover all relevant cases and exclude all others. Similarly, I can offer a definition of sexualization, but there will always be a grey area. It is also not of much interest to me to know if male sportsmen get equally overt sexual comments as female ones. My guess is less, but we have empirical research to sort that out. What I find worthy of inquiry is whether sexual ranking, maybe, sexual judgment, is not mich more prevalent as we give it credit for. To find that out we need a more phenomenological approach, how much is our world colored by sexual perception of people, situations, words, etc.
Hand washing is interesting though in this regard. I am not sure actually that people that wash their hands are more desirable. the act of hand washing is an act that conforms to social norms, but perhaps the act of explicitly not washing your hands and looking defiantly is actually considered more desirable, I do not know. The point here is that confirmation with norms may seem to get you ahead, but I am not sure it always does. In fact I think a whole body of tacit unarticulated norms exist that celebrate deviance. That is the point of my inquiry, are there social norms, probably not articulated and pertaining to sexual desirability that determine who is considered a desirable partner, but not articulated as such. I think there are and I think it explains a lot of male behaviour, but probably also female.
To me that is a bit naive. Why would they engage in this competition? Just for the heck of it? No, to be ranked, to be sexualized actually. In fact, I would make my claim stronger, the only reason men engage into ridicuclous feats of strength is because women value it sexually. I do not mind that per se, but we should be clear on why people do certain things.
I was not talking about murder as defined in the law. You can talk about (and define) murder outside the confines of the law.
I wouldn’t say always but sure. The grey area can’t be too large though.
Really? If people ranked “person who washes their hands” and “person who doesn’t” in terms of desirability, we wouldn’t find one over the other? If you put “I never wash my hands btw” in your dating bio, that won’t negatively affect your profile?
I mean, there are many common reasons why one would compete outside of “to be sexualized” and “for the heck of it”. And I am not sure if you understood it, but I was talking about the public sexualizing the athletes, presumably when they watch them.
Money? Fame? Where do you get this idea from? That’s an even more questionable claim than whatever you’ve been saying until now.
Ohh, I guess it is context dependent then… different within the confines of law and outside…
I think it would and I am sure if you asked people you would get that answer. I am not too sure about what people do. Maybe people who do not wash their hands are unconsciously seen as possessing a certain bravado, or a certain carefree and risk taking attitude that people find attractive. Only empirical research, hard though that would be in this case, could give a definite answer. One could begin by making two groups, one of people who wash their hands and another of people that do not and then count the number of romantic partners. When would have to account for all kinds of confounding factors of course, but taking what people say for granted is even more questionable.
Yes, but you think sexualization only occurs when this is overtly the case, when sexual remarks are made about them. I think there is a sexual element in sports in general yes. It is not the only element, there is a large social component now, competition is valued for its own sake these days. It is strange though, and wasteful, performing a task with no goal outside of it at all. I do think the original ‘telos’ of sports was to compete in sexual selection, much like peacocking, belling or antler locking. Another aspect is I think to assess fitness for war, but the relationship between war and sex will have to wait for another time.
Why would we accord money and fame to someone who weighs a heavy lift only to put it down again?
I get it, no hand washing, fine. What about brushing your teeth? Is that not desirable? What about washing your body? Is that not desirable? If it is, do you sexualize yourself when doing it?
What do you mean “no goal outside of it”? What tasks have goals “outside of it”?
because of the entertainment it provides? Why would it not be the same reason we accord money and fame to women who weigh a heavy lift only to put it down again?
But even if it is for the reason you want it to be, that doesn’t mean men only do it because women value it sexually. They could still do it for the money and not care about the fact that the money (supposedly) comes from women valuing it sexually.
Yes we have other reasons to clean ourselves, good reasons too. Many practices have multiple reasons but I never claimed otherwise. Healthy teeth are indeed partially a sexual attractive trait I think yes. Is wearing make up a part of a sexualized gender dynamic? I would say yes and still one is applying it to oneself. I think sexualisation, the evaluation, implicit or explicit, of activities in terms of or because of their real or perceived sexual appeal, are very frequently applied to oneself. Are we conscious of that? no often times not. We have simply internalized the gaze of the other, with reference to Foucault.
Vacuum cleaning comes to mind. It is really not an activity undertaken for its own sake. I think other mundane activities like taking out the thrash also aren’t.
Well, practices and the reasons have a tendency to change over time. Indeed many things are valued in sports. My argument here is that the original reason for which the activity was entered into has over time acquired more meanings, became also valued in itself. At some point in time even a cerebral activity like chess became counted as a sport. In this day and age this seems to be turning again. The original point of the activity though has not been lost. It is not frequently discussed because ‘men’ is the default gender in sports. Men never had to motivate why they entered into sports. Women have. See for instance the discussions about women’s soccer in Europe. It is easy though to invalidate my theory. If male and female sports were alike, then were sports events entered historically entered into by men and women alike? I am not sure but it is easy to research based on historical data. I also wonder why so many sports seem tailored to men, spear throwing, hammer throwing, weight lifting, all activities in which men were more capable then women. sports, like so many other human activities are tailored towards men as the default. There can be many reasons for this so if we indeed find that sports events were entered into by men and only later by women it is by no means clear demonstration of my point. It may well be the patriarchy which kept women away from sports events. However, if you would find that both men and women engaged in the same sport from the beginning of time onwards, my position certainly looks in trouble.
The question is, why does it in itself be worthy of honors and rewards? There is no reason whatsoever to award someone for the mere act of lifting a heavier weight unless this indicated some specific quality. Now one quality that comes to mind is war. sports have also reflected all the qualities of a useful soldier in antiquety, so that is a good candidate. What I wonder about is where the implicit sexualised practices around sports come from. the aforementioned podium girls, the lady of the tournament crowning the winner and so on. It might well be that they were a later invention. That would raise an interesting question, when did the implicit sexualisation of sports began? All well and good, but you are denying a sexual ‘tout court’.
I think I know the reason why. It is because you somehow think that by arguing that male bodies have been under pressure to conform to certain standards and that these standards were sexual, or at least, imposed by sexual roles, I somehow diminish from the harm done to women by men and their imposition of all kinds of sexualized norms. That is not my intention at all though. I think patriarchical structures of power are very real. I also think we could understand these power structures better when we also take into account the sexual pressure on men, their need to ‘perform’. Not in order to say ‘ahah, see men are victims too’, I’m not talking about victimization, at most only in the sense of being objectified in some way, but to understand the dynamic better.
I do wonder about @AmadeusD 's suggestion that:
Is that simply saying men suffer more violence in general? Or is there an implication that the violence suffered is a result of sexualization? I think sexualization plays a part in it, but implicitly, in the whole structure of society, but when you equate sexualization with male athletes being remarked upon in an overtly sexualized way, I think there is some inconsistency. If perverted remarks are counted I doubt men would win in frequency or intensity. When looking at politicians suffering sexist remarks, women clearly bear the brunt of that. I am just wondering whether you also feel sexualization plays a role in the structure of society, or if it only counts as such when it is open and explicit?
So, just to be clear, brushing your teeth is sexualizing yourself?
Neither is competing in sports.
I never claimed that. But tell me, why do we accord money and fame to women lifting weights?
If you dig deep enough, you will find a connection between sex and anything. That’s not what sexualization is usually about. But again, that’s not even the issue. The issue was not clarifying the term when you are using it idiosyncratically. Now we could debate on whether your ‘sexualization’ is an interesting concept, but if you bite the bullet on the tooth brushing, I think I cannot do anything more.
I have no idea how you came to this conclusion. I acknowledge the gender roles and norms imposed on men; I’ve said that many times. I’ve clarified many times that you wouldn’t have heard about me had you not used the word ‘sexualization’ because that’s not what sexualization is.
Thank you very much for your time. I have a better understanding of the dictionary definition of sexualization now.
Yoga Pants.
What does it mean for masculinity? - What does it mean to a man to have in society the entire female arse depicted to him as a global essay of the final conclusive usurpation and pre-emptive termination of any possible natural sexual idea and intention by the undermining and destabilizing compulsory presentation before the apprehensive faculty, of the female arse itself in humiliated and violated naked and bleak totality and thereafter freely exhibited to him routinely in his public intercourses?
We see this fact as a direct and as a frontal attack upon any native original masculinity in his being. This is because this public act of vaginal/anal disclosure forces a man (by its presentation to him of the final sexual facts immediately) to indifference and insensitivity as his only and as his obligate means of survival abroad in public. It is oppressive.
There is a sense of transgression and of the thorough violation of dignity in the sudden arrival and ubiquity of it so exhibited (the female anus and pudenda) in our public life - it all becomes there in its unquestioned and unquestionable insistence as archetype anomalously or impertinently disclosed, importunate and alien, into the public mode, wherein it creates by the final force of its inevitable real being, a negative space where the basic nature of a man has no meaning or value in society, and all such has now been effectively discarded by the power of marketing alone.
For it is marketing that has developed the original natural dominance and meaning of the vagina/female anus into a position of preeminent global supremacy in our public lives. A terminal sense of degradation ensues. For a man, the experience is of a catastrophe. The ‘white patriarchy’ has targeted for disposal - its own men and every other man as well. They must not have a libido to speak of. There is nowhere for it anymore. It has thrown them all away as if they were nothing or even as if they were everything.
This marketing victory has at the core of it, an ideological objective involving the intended degradation of human awareness itself into a dedicated facility of marketing, and with no extant capacity to form sense impressions or to have experience of anything other than marketing and henceforth to be subsumed entirely into the artificial and into the inauthentic, finally and hopelessly.
Humanity is to be synthesized, neutralized and finished - by the marketing other. We can see now that in the relentless and in the unoriginal public presentation of the female pudenda/anus that human spirit and human nature are to be destroyed.
Today I went into a newsagent
on the Finchley road
to purchase £10 Lyca Mobile
for Jorge on my way to see him
just before I entered the store
a woman also entered
I came in behind her
and she dropped off a mail package for posting
what was noteworthy about her
is that her lovely lower body
was covered in a skin tight and sheer garment
the colour was black
the material of its fabrication was very thin and tight indeed
she was slim and very attractive
a fine figure and a balanced and human face
intelligent modest and querulous
her arse freely exhibited as it was there in a final
geometrical factual confession of sex
was absolutely and stunningly sensational and commanding
to the eyes
and profoundly inspiring of immediate seminal erotic arousal
the impact was as of
one of the best and one of the finest arses ever seen in human life
and due to her attire
I was able to closely scrutinize
and to assess her phenomenal and her addictive arse
and to develop a deep appreciation and fondness of it
a feeling of intense sexual love
based upon the detailed facts
of its explicitly demonstrated buttockular forms
disclosed there in a manner that in former times
was not remotely possible or achievable
for a man happening into a news store
her garment was not cut to be entirely approximate
at the anus
in the form
of many of these modern garments
which are designed to exhibit and to absolutely reveal
the feminine posterior and legs
in the sense that the material
of her particular garment was not fixing itself
entirely between her butt cheeks
at the anus itself
but rather was stretched tightly across that area
at some appreciable distance from the anus therein
and it was not as far as I could see
in actual contact with her asshole
as many of these garments tend to be in this age
it is often the case that
they are cut (these garments) very snugly
many of them
right into the asshole
and fitting there
immodestly
against the asshole itself
the elevation of the female arse and asshole
in our present society
into nodes and into signifiers of inevitably supreme meaning
in our public life
by the use and deployment
of this form and type of attire
in our age
is not a reassuring modern development
in our view
for the reason that
very many women in our time have been conscripted
into this voluntary and flagrant
exhibition of the detailed final form
of their arses in public
but this is not
as it might initially seem
before the shallow
and before the dispirited
a boon for erect manhood
the reason for that is
that the clearly illogical and morally antithetical
and brazenly naked and forlorn
and widespread and common
exhibition of the female arse
in our society today
is demonstrably so because
it has been
consented to by these women
it has been volunteered
but not in any moral or ethical
conceptual progression or intention
to approach the divine whatsoever or at all
but rather
because of a failure of consciousness upon their part
and not because of any original
or critically or spiritually developed sense
of the value or necessity of the act
and of its meaning in relation to God
therefore the female arse becomes
in this existential secular bankruptcy
a clarion of danger
and a signal of moral deficiency and inadequacy
because it is very clear
that if a woman can be manipulated
as she has been
addled violated and fooled
into flaunting her naked buttocks
openly and brazenly
and unashamedly
so easily
in society
it must be asked vehemently
what will she not do
what crime will she not commit
in order to satisfy the requirements
of the governing marketing intelligence
which she has voluntarily submitted to
and which has instructed her to act so rashly
and to perform this violent
and this outrageous exhibitionistic act
of naked and of revealing bodily disclosure
before the anonymous eyes
of a confounded and apprehensive masculinity
at large and thus assailed confounded mocked and bewildered
in society today.
For what it’s worth, I think “typical” is generally going to be a sturdy starting point. “the typical male” seems a fine concept to me.
I think you may be mixing up two senses of “self-reliant”. I think the sense you mean is better captured by something like “off-grid”. While there are plenty of people who are self-reliant in this way, i mean in the way that one can handle their own affairs with aplomb. That’s all. I think “master of his own world” is probably a decent way to frame this intellectually, but in practice it’s often far more a caretaker, than master, type role.
Fair enough. It seems to be one of the more reliable conceptual ground-floors we have to discuss things from. You could invoke this to discuss moral behaviour too. Plenty do.
That’s quite different from basic behaviour though. I am loathe to speak here any further about women (or any gender/sex) but I could invoke the general impulse to protect children. That seems basic in terms of human reactions - a different response would be an aberration. I suppose would could say this is cultural, but I have an extremely hard time believing that based on both intuition and my understanding of children’s lot throughout history.
That’s also true - it’s just, clearly, only going to apply to a subset and so can be considered aberrant in this sense - that’s probably why we’re happy to criminalize those sorts of behaviour.
And that’s fair. But I would suggest there has been, and will always be, experiments in hedonism, sexual exploration, acseticism, deep spiritual devotion etc.. etc.. and we’ll get all kinds. But the pregnant middle of a voting population are predictable and boring, in the birds eye view, I think.
I do not really mind it, but I think the typical male, like the typical female, like the typical child, the typical grandma or whatever typical role one fullfills, subject to change. I think there are material differences and those make certain divisions of labour more plausible. Perhaps I have a little more difficulty jumping from the is to the ought.
I do not disagree, but I think the material becomes mixed up with the ideal, with the historical contingent and with a kind of vagueness of language. When is one ’ master of his own world’ and could or should not women be ‘masters of their own world’? It is not disagreement with you per se, because those are exactly the tropes I would like to explore and you very generously provide a thread along the lines of which exploration may occur, so I am grateful. The enquiry I envisioned actually went along those lines. What kind of attitude is expected of men and women, what role does sexuality play in those attitudes and if we indeed find that men should be ’ masters of their own world’ and that it is more expected of them than it is of women, or at least, perhaps their worlds are perceived as different, what does it tell us?
Sure and it should also be taken into account, but so should the changing world of social arrangements. Caring for the weak might not be a great survival strategy but still we do. Or, if we stop doing that, why? The biological can explain something, but their is always a social counter example and vice versa. I do think though we are in an age in which at least philosophically ‘materiality’ started to matter more again. We are out of the age of discourse and ‘there is nothing besides text’, but if we are, do than traditional role divisions are set for a come back, also in philosophy? Philosophy still seems very critical of sexism, colonialism, but how does that chime with a reappreciation of the material? It is in response to you but of course not all kinds of questions for you to answer, these just drove my curiosity.
I tend to agree with you there. I do also think some emotional responses are hard wired into our brain. It is an interesting example because here the biological explanation and the social one agree. We all react to children in need of help and we also feel it is good to help them. In male female relationships the answer is less clear cut, as many of the replies here show.
And here I tend to look for more complexity, because even though the behaviour is criminalized often, the most recent of such behaviours being criminalized is stalking I think, I also feel that cultural sentiment is ambivalent about this. Listen for instance to the stalker song “every breath you take” from Sting,
or see movies as different as “Love Actually” and “The graduate” where decidedly odd behaviour is rewarded. The incessant chase for a loved one is at once criminalized, but also glorified. Actually, I think, (but I do not know, that is why I started this thread) such ambiguous norms are quite characteristic of gender norms applied to men, they may as well be to women, but again, this exploration is what drove me. (And of course the role sex plays in their emergence for those who wonder).
I do not understand exactly what you mean by the allusion to the pregnant middle, but it intuitively rings a bell and makes me agree 
perhaps because I also agree with the rest, yes, there will always be experiments and I think sex always plays a part in them, even in the ascetic ones, an important part. So let’s not be boring and boldly explore.
@tun What have you been smoking… 
I would say so. Perhaps a better phrase (whether you accept its underlying assumption or not) would be proto-typical. Some indication that these attributes typify the type, not the individual. All men are male (yes, yes, controversial apparently, but the point hopefully is clear).
I hope I haven’t come across as demanding a moral dimension to this typification. I think it just is. I don’t think it is open to us to make a moral call on it. We can just wallow in how it makes us feel.
Yes, I can see that - fair enough.
When one feels they are empowered to take of themselves and those around them.
Anyone who wants this, can go for it. I just suggest that as an evolutionary species, we have developed lines along which our sexes develop post-birth. It’s not hte case that both typically lead to this type of self-reliance. This may be problematic, but as I say, I’m not making a moral call.
To quote a screenwriter paraphrasing one of hte greatest Wordsmiths of the Western tradition: “That guys and chicks are different”. I don’t think it tells us much else - I think hte determination to read into this some kind of moral or decision-centric aspect of human life is both misguided, and the source of immense psychological pain that could be avoided by simply accepting things we are not able to change (plenty of arguments in behind this kind of statement - but notice, I am nowhere suggesting there should be enforcement of any of this, socially/culturally).
Yeah, i get this. But I think this sort of discussion has a clear, but highly uncomfortable conclusion lest we avoid simply hating on everyone we dislike. Social counter-examples don’t tend against biological reality. They are just experiments,and in this arena, almost always failed ones (remember, de Bouviour claimed women should be prevented from being SAHMs becuase too many will choose to do so. I suggest this is absolutely normal, typical and (now I make a moral claim) better for all (as opposed to enforcing engagement with that which the individual may have no interest(outside the home))).
No, these are great questions. I think philosophy is something humans are not ‘designed’ to do, and so these sorts of expectations can be removed. That said, I see pretty clear and uncomfortable threads among female, male and trans philosophers which I can critique or praise based on the group (because of the correlation.. not because I have some inbuilt bias. Just observational comments). Outside of Phil, I think a return to “traditional” roles is always happening. There is a pretty small group who tout and engage in non-traditional roles, globally or in the West. Something like “Women work” isn’t something I would considered factors here. PLenty of women don’t want kids, so in the traditional framework - what do they do?? I think its obvious..
Yes - I think ‘hard wired’ might be a bit far, but yes, I think there are some pretty standard human reactions which are survivalist in nature (which is probably why bigotry, tbf).
Agreed. And my take there is that culture has removed from us these standard, traditional responses to males and females. It has been quite destructive to both the relationship pool (in a general sense - not romantic) and has probably hindered progress in ways I’d need to really think about before writing down.
[quote=“Tobias, post:91, topic:420”]
And here I tend to look for more co
[/quote] (placeholder - reply to this whole para).
Yeah, that’s good. There’s an ambiguity that goes further - there’s a trope,and I am well aware that is it accurate, I just don’t know how widespread, that for a female (single, available etc…) the difference between Adonis and an absolute Creep is whether or not she is attracted to him. For story telling, tihs is a get-out-of-jail-free card because hte male is considered conscientious, a fighter and someone willing to do what it takes to do what he knows is right.
But, had she not wanted him, it would be disgusting stalking behaviour we assume would reuslt in prison time. This isn’t quite how it works in the opposite direction. You can think here of how differently we treat male teachers who sleep with their students (lets assume high school) and females who do it(although, that’s changing we still have Trump essentially saying the boys weren’t harmed).
To clarify the final part there, I consider the spctrum of voters - one end of say 20% will be truly right wing, and the same on the other end. The pregnant middle is hte 60% of people who don’t give a toss about hte drama in the media and just vote because they like what they’re hearing etc.. They just do what they do without much interrogation.