I finally understand what objectification means. Having been so far into it my whole life, I could never really see it clearly. We can all guess that to objectify means to turn something into an object. And we are taught society objectifies women. Yet, I've never felt inanimate. I don't feel like a ball or a couch or a fork. I feel like me, like a girl grown big, not a fork.

My husband and are watching Girls and were discussing the main character's body, this morning. It pleases me, so much, to finally see a nude woman on screen with a very normal body. Her breasts are so small they look adolescent to me. She has a round tummy and a nice fat ass. She is smart enough and she has a lot of sex. And she doesn't appear, on screen, to have too many horrible hangups about her shape. She has hangups, she's a person. But she proceeds with herself. Which is unbelievably refreshing to witness. I asked my husband if he finds her attractive, physically. And then held my breath, wondering in that instant, which was the right answer?

My teenagers have been told looks have nothing much to do with attractiveness. Attraction is all pheromones intertwined with personality. And you can't do much about either. Generally, if you smell right to a partner then you'll be attractive. Shape, style, perfume, clothes, cosmetics, this stuff never fools anyone worthy. Knowing this is true, I still held my breath for my husband's answer.

Later today, I flicked through Luna Luna and happened across 33 Things I've Learned About Being a Woman. Neither the zine nor the article are earth shattering. But I was struck by point #2, especially in the context of coffee conversation about nudity and sex this morning: 

"You will never, ever, ever be another person on Earth beside you. It sounds like a cheap answer to our pathological, collective addiction to beauty and objectifying others (even when it’s not sexual) but once you stop paying attention to the comparison, you’re left feeling a lot less like you’re abusing yourself."

Oh, right! Objectification is what happens when I compare my body to other women. Objectification is when I worry my husband won't find me attractive as we age. Objectification is my daughter worrying over any detail of her insanely perfect hair, skin, and shape.  Objectification is us seeing ourselves as bodies, rather than people inhabiting bodies. And so, forgetting that our personage is the most attractive part of us, we mistake what is important about being lovable. Attractiveness is an inside out phenomenon. Thoughts to the contrary are objectification.

We do this to ourselves. We learn the process of objectification through media, of course. But it is engrained at school. Where, day after day, every day, all the time, no matter what, children practice objectifying each other and their selves. By Jr. High the gaze is relentless. From which homeschooling offers the briefest of respites. For which, on behalf of my kids, I am so grateful.