Do Feminists Ever Consider That They Might Be Wrong?

Wow, this is a big question. If I was to present my own opinion on this, I'll have to get a bit wordy, but I'll still try to keep it relatively brief.

Tl;dr: If we are talking about representation in media, and not about real life humans, then I think there's something to be said for broadening the roles to include women as sexually objectifying and men as sexually objectified. This is okay since there are so many other competing perspectives to balance it out.

Long version:

First of all, let us define "objectification". I will be using it in the meaning of viewing or showing someone as an object rather than a subject, someone who is acted on instead of someone who acts, a tool rather than a human (the assumption being that recognising someone as a human necessitates that we consider their emotions, agency and human rights). When your interest in someone is more in what function they fill, rather than in their complex humanity, that can be called objectification. Note that this can happen in degrees.

Methods of objectifying someone in books, movies or images include to only show them in a single or a few defined contexts or roles (or letting those contexts or roles shine through no matter the other contexts or roles they are given), to not give them a voice of their own or multifaceted descriptions so that they remain unexplored and unexplained to the reader, to have them be reactive to the subject rather than taking their own initiatives and so on.

It is my opinion that objectification is always a part of society. Look at that thing up there: "an interest in their complex humanity" is actually really hard to conjure up in many cases. Sure, you may smile at the mail carrier, but honestly, the most important thing is that they bring your mail, right? A new (or even old) romantic interest will always have that tinge of selfishness in it; why else would you be interested? We will maintain a circle of friends which we are genuinely interested in, and the further out from that we get, we will be civil but we can't really be said to be interested in getting to know them more than we have to in order for us to cooperate - that is, serve functions to each other.

This leads to the conclusion that objectification is not ALWAYS a problem. Often, it's quite necessary in order to not overload us. The problem arises, in my opinion, when objectification occurs in too high a degree and in the wrong context.

Here, I'd like to divide the discussion into two parts: one concerning real, actual, living, flesh and blood, human beings PEOPLE, and the other concerning representations of people, characters, made of ink, words, or film sequences. I think this division is motivated since there are clear and abundant differences between the categories, making it impossible to treat them completely analogously. They are, however, far from completely separate either, as I will touch on later.

With the real people category, it's entirely obvious to me that we should consider each other with as much respect, interest and love as we can muster. If someone with whom I am supposed to be close, such as a sibling or a romantic partner or someone else inside that close circle I mentioned, is being egotistical and treating me badly, then that can be understood as a problem of objectification in the wrong context. If you can't even muster basic decency towards people you interact with in general, that could be seen as a problem of objectification in too high a degree.

I am of the opinion that neither of those are okay. These kinds of situations can lead to physical, mental or emotional damage and must be considered on the individual level. They cannot be tolerated.

When it comes to the category of representation, things change a bit, in my opinion. Here, the individual level does not exist, because there are no individuals, no humans. Here are only characters, who are fully created by ink, words and imagination. These characters will always, always, always be to some degree (often a large one) reduced or objectified, since no author can capture the fullness of a human being. Therefore, the individual becomes less interesting than the state of the media at large.

When we talk about objectification, the discussion often tends to point to one example and dwell on how horrifying it is. While it is certainly important to put up individual works as examples, that's not where the problem lies, in my opinion. The problem lies in the hegemony of a single perspective. To put it crudely, it's not a problem if there's a image of a woman with her boobs out. There is a problem if all the images of women have their boobs out, particularly if they all have their boobs out in situations where they wouldn't reasonably have them out, for the sole reason that women have their boobs out. (That's just a clarifying example. I'm not claiming all women have their boobs out.)

The reason this is problematic is, of course, that you can't be what you can't see, if there's a huge prevalence of one perspective, if all (or most) women characters are given certain contexts or roles to work within, then that will restrict the conception of the category "woman", and that's not really fair to those who have to relate to it daily. This is one of those places where the representative and real person category touch, as I mentioned above. If there is a big number of different and complex perspectives offered, however, then the problem of the influence of a single perspective can be counteracted by the influence of another, effectively counteracting the problem.

The conclusion here is that there is a quantitative aspect to consider in the representative category, which did not exist in the real human category due to the individual perspective (it's always only about the one person at a time). It's okay to have objectifying perspectives as long as there are also subjectifying perspectives to counteract. This means that the current balance of those perspectives becomes relevant.

Wow, that took a while. What was the question again?

Ah, thanks.

The conclusion I come to is that you have to look at the current balance of perspectives. I personally think that if there's been a prominence of male subjects versus female objects (which, historically, it has), then yes, it's okay to counteract that by giving a greater presence not only to female subjects but also to male objects. This sends the message that women can take a greater interest in themselves and their own agency and desires, and also provides the perspective of what it's like to be objectified like women to males, which I personally think we could use a dose of. It's not like there's even remotely a balance here, anyway, at least not if you look at the same subjects of objectification (sexuality, romance etc, the mote common ones and the ones we typically mean when we just say "objectification").

That said, I want to point that there are also objectifying and stereotyping themes for men which are currently in imbalance.

So that's my answer. I'll just briefly comment on my opinions on the arguments brought up.

That's much to broad to be significant. I think it also fails to properly see the other things that give power, where social class of parents are the big factor. On similar grounds, it also equates "men" with "the patriarchy", which I think is problematic.

The formulation "men have created rape culture" bothers me (again, I'd have preferred "the patriarchy"), but I can see what they were going for. I think the statement is true. I don't quite see how it's an argument for anything?

As explained above, I think there is room for some more objectified images of men relating to the subjects typically associate with women objectification in the representative category. I don't think that'd harm men in general since there are so many other perspectives to counterbalance it.

That one resonates with my views. Of course, it could empower women while also damaging males, but as said above, I don't think the balance is at the point where it risks tipping yet. In the representative category, of course.

Utter bullshit.

True by default, but accepting it's existence does not have to mean condoning it. We can see a real difference here. Now let's fight it.

Wow, that was a long one. I'm finally done. Thank you for reading, and...

Oh, right. That too.

In the above, I've been talking about images in the entirety of our culture. It becomes a bit more specialised if you look at subgroups of that culture. I think it's important to consider things like genre assumptions here.

Porn is a label. A "trigger warning" if you will, ridiculed as that term is (I think it still serves a function, if not taken to mean things it wasn't supposed to mean, but I digress). It denotes a certain content. Crime novels will have police and murders in them. Musicals will have singing and dancing. Porn will have fucking and women with the boobs out (unless it's gay, I guess). When picking up a piece of porn media, you accept that it will contain certain things that come with the territory, such as sexualization of normally non-sexual situations, for example. This acceptance creates a distance to the medium, and we can to some degree sort it out of the amount of images the build a "real" representation of humanity (that's not saying that our high porn consumption in general today isn't reflected in our other media, but that's a bit beside my point). That, in my opinion, lightens the burden on porn to be "representative": we accept that it's not.

That's not saying that there's not different kinds of porn. In fact, there's a stunning variety: there's everything from the movies aimed at a couples who want to have a hot night together, to the Animal Trainer series (hint: the animals are women). But frankly, if you accept that absolutely everything will be about sex, and therefore discount that as an objectifying factor (which can be discussed, I suppose; I will do so for this purposes of this discussion), then we can see such a big variety in porn that I'm actually kind of proud. I think it's one of the more diverse genres, frankly, and almost anyone can find something that speaks to them. Of course, there are still big imbalances (I'd not be surprised if the lesbian porn aimed at actual lesbians was negligible in comparison to that aimed at straight men), but on a whole, I don't think porn is doing badly.

Alright, I've said my peace. Thank yo for reading, and if you have comments, feel free to post them!

see the trouble with all of these is this general isn't how a educated feminists thinks, imo. or the answers are soon clear cut, yes or no answers. I use the word educated, meaning someone that has looking in to the movement beyond some they heard from a internet article or heard their friends. but here are my answers:
Women do have power, but just less then men in many realms western culture. this one is hard to explain right now but I can get into it more later.
Rape culture is real but not solely in men benefit. In fact it could be successful argued that men can suffer from rape culture just has much as women, though it is much harder on women in general.
Sexual Objectification is has natural part of life for most people. It's how we began the process of whom we want to try dating or just for fun. But the problem is if that the only thing we do to the sex we are attracted to. It is my belief that women are more objectified then men here in the states, in the sense that they have a more stringent standard that they are up held too and or more liked to be viewed solely as a sexy 'thing'. Quick example is how most men talk about Emma Watson ( she's hot) versus how most women talk about Channing Tatum ( his cute and funny and talented).
Is objectifying men empowering? I can see how someone would think that, but I believe the empowerment comes less from the objectifying and more from embracing your own sexuality. Male sexuality is more accepted the female sexuality and in a lot of cases, is seen has something that should be hidden. So when a women is openly embracing her sexuality, it's a big deal to many of them. But is it wrong? No more then it is for a rational guy. it's a part of life.
Sexy is relative. What I find sexy is be different then others. The problem is the 'Standardized Sexy' that infest in the west. Men have to be big and well muscled and women have to be thin, well endowed and curvy. It any best impractical and at worse dangerous. I've seen a lot of bulimia in guys trying to drop weight for a lot of reason. In the circles I run ,the idea is to be more accepting of all body type , both men and women.
Equality begins at accepting there are double standards, but we also have to move to make changes.
Keep in mind that these are just my thoughts on it. All of these questions have way more detailed, better thought answers.

I mean educated like uses critical thinking to make their own judgment. and I I mean the "West" like the U.S. mostly because I never been to other parts of the world and making judgments without first hand experience is something I try not to do.

I just love that last sentence of yours. I think it clearly explain the line between identifying as a feminist and obviously being a closed minded asshole.

Hi there. I find this very interesting. I hope can say more about it.