Objectification?

[spoil][font=verdana][color=green]I hate the way that this thread has gone. It has now derailed to objectification of women alone; there's already a thread that covers that well enough. It's here https://www.fakku.net/viewtopic.php?t=72492.

Now, back onto the topic of objectification as a whole.

Personally, I believe that the subject of objectification is something that someone automatically does when they first meet someone. For example, going back to the women scenario - only briefly - if I see a woman that I'm physically attracted to, I'd be honest and admit that I think "Oh wow, she be great to have sex with". Does that mean that I say it out right? No. Does it mean that I'll wolf-whistle at her? No. Of course not. However, by thinking that, I have objectified her.

Another example could be a random dog you see walking down the street with an owner. If I go up to the dog and give it a stroke and generous petting, I've objectified that dog as a pet. Even though the dog is already a pet of the owner, I, myself, have objectified the dog as a potential pet. If I were to measure it's legs etc, I could have objectified it as a hunting dog/breeding dog/show dog.

Moving onto tools as a whole. These are objects, and thus can be objectified with fear of chastisement from anyone else about objectifying them. However, these in turn can be construed in different ways; i.e. you may see a wooden circular object as a chopping board and I as a circular tray. Is this discriminatory? No; just our minds connecting what we see to what we would want it for.

Of course, this goes back to the first paragraph I discussed about women. Biologically, a male, when it sees a female that it's attracted to, will want it to have sex with. Animals do it all the time, yet they are never scorned for doing so. It is our species self-perceived notion of Civilisation that prevents this view being the norm. It's just that, sometimes, some people choose to base their views on objectification alone; rather than ignoring their previous objectifications and interacting with the object not based on objectification i.e. talking to the women; not petting the dog or reading up on wooden circles.

That's what objectification is. Perceiving something as an object. Whether it be human, animal or an actual object; the actual subject is much wider than originally discussed here.