Feminist dualism and the hatred of the body

I saw a presentation recently by a professor of politics named Caroline Heldman on the subject of sexual objectification of women. She ended the talk this way:

“I’d like you to imagine a world where girls and women don’t spend an hour every morning putting on their makeup and doing their hair. I’d like you to imagine a world where women are valued for what they say and what they do rather than the way they look. I would like you to imagine a world where instead of spending time on dress and appearance...”

I once heard a professor of women’s studies, a very pretty woman, while discussing this subject say to her husband, “You weren’t attracted to me for my looks, of course!” (He, a prudent man, did not say anything.)

This is a common feminist, or at least pop-feminist, sentiment. I.e., you should not value me for my looks, you should value me for my mind, or my strength, or my politics, etc. Looks are superficial, real beauty is on the inside, etc. In sum, love me for who I am, not what I look like.

Statements like these reveal a certain philosophy of human nature: mind-body dualism. This is the philosophical view that the mind is the real person, and the body is a shell. The body is inessential, the mind is essential, to who I am.

Mind-body dualism is the philosophical basis for statements like these. It is also implicit in ‘sex reassignment therapy’ and proposals (or fait accompli) for allowing people to use sex-segregated areas (like bathrooms and changing rooms) according to their internal ‘gender identity’ rather than their biological sex.

It says: “what’s really important is what gender you are in your mind: the biological sex of your body is of no consequence—so, if your mental identity doesn’t ‘match’ the body you were given at birth, we will treat your gender identity as real and the sex of your body as unreal—or, we’ll change it through surgery, hormonal therapy, hair removal, etc.”

This is the mainstream and indeed enforced view now, taught in schools, pushed by the media, and legally mandated. If you don’t accept this philosophical position you are a homophobe, sexist, intolerant, etc.

Its logical extension is transhumanism: “one day we will upload our minds to a computer and live entirely in virtual (that is, mental) reality; or, we will have bodies projected by our minds, etc.” Sex reassignment therapy is merely the first fruits of transhumanism. I read one feminist author who looked with anticipation for a day when we will be able through technology to create an artificial or freestanding womb, so that reproduction can be separated from the bodies of women.

Mind-body dualism is, of course, not new. Nowadays it is associated with the name of Descartes; but in the West its greatest author was Plato. Its origin may be in the East; it appears fundamental to Buddhism.

The history of this philosophy shows that there is always a tendency to go from viewing the body as an arbitrary or inconsequential shell to viewing it as a prison—as in sex reassignment therapy, the general idea of being ‘a woman trapped in a man’s body,’ and the desire of some feminists to free women from their fertility—and from there to view the body as evil and to hate it—evident in self-mutilation and the general trend of women deliberately making themselves ugly.

 Mind-body dualism has been a perpetual temptation for Christians, as seen in the various heresies which have infected the Church: the Gnostics, the Manichees (Augustine was one), the Cathars... but it is not the Christian view.

The Christian view is that a human person (a man or woman) is a unity of body and mind; or to put it in older English, body and ghost. The older word points to the truth: a mind without a body is a ghost, that is, a pathetic and incomplete fragment of a human person.

The separation of mind and body is how Christians define death.

This separation began at the Fall, when the body ceased to be obedient to the mind, and the two became opposed, the one leading the other into temptation. Christ restored the unity of body and mind in himself: the Second Person of the Trinity took on a male body and became a man, died, and rose again in his body. Christ has a body now, and forever: He will never be un-incarnate.

Thus the Christian view of eternal life is not a pure intellectual life of the mind, with the dissolution of the body—it is the resurrection of the body.

Transhumanism—uploading our minds to live in a virtual world—proposes death as a utopia. It offers living death as a rival to the Christian resurrection.

One of the many ironies of our culture—or rather a Big Lie—is “Christians hate and fear the body, and our enlightened culture embraces it.” This is a Big Lie because the precise reverse is the truth. Our culture says the body is an inconsequential shell, and is well on its way toward hating and fearing the body. The Christian tradition says the body is integral to who you are, and you will have your body (glorified and perfected) in eternity.

Therefore, do not ignore biological sex, or pretend that it is not real. A biological male or female is who you are. Don’t try to change it—part of redemption is the reintegration of body and mind, the restoration of wholeness to the person. Work at that, with God’s grace, in this life.

Finally, Christians must reject the language and sentiment of “don’t value me for my looks, value me for my intelligence, my strength, my humour, my politics: that is who I am.” Your looks are also who you are. And physical beauty is a good thing, and ought to be valued as intelligence or strength are valued. We should not only value beauty, or value it as the most important thing, but we should love people for their beauty. And therefore, within the proper bounds, it is a good thing to cultivate beauty just as it is a good thing to cultivate any other excellence. Beauty is a treasure: increase the treasure God gave you.

“And so he that had received five talents came and brought other five talents, saying, Lord, thou deliveredst unto me five talents: behold, I have gained beside them five talents more.

His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant...”