Objectification (of human beings)

A fallacy of reasoning or abstraction that consists of viewing people as objects (and treating them as such).

Here is an example of a form of business speak that many of you will no doubt have heard or read before:

“The available resources should be utilised more effectively in order to effectively carry out the required tasks.”

What is being objectified here as “resources” are people. They should be referred to as such. In this case, for example, as “employees” or “colleagues”.

One might dismiss such language as “management jargon” – and indeed, in most cases, it is likely to be nothing more than an unreflective adoption of terminology encountered in a professional context. However, such a choice of language can equally be a symptom of a mindset in which workers and employees are no longer perceived as human beings, but primarily in terms of their function – namely as “resources” – who can be hired and fired as needed, moved from one position to another, etc. – without having to take into account any possible consequences on a human level.

For comparison, here is the same statement phrased in a way that, at the very least, does not immediately give the impression that employees are perceived as nothing more than objects to the management:

“We want to ensure that our colleagues are placed in roles where their skills are put to the best possible use.”

• Dehumanisation
• Hypostatisation
• Reification

On this website, “objectification” is used as an umbrella term for situations in which people are, in one way or another, regarded or treated as “things” or “objects”. In other contexts, the above terms can be used as synonyms, or referring to specific aspects of the phenomenon. However, this usage is not very consistent, as each of these terms can also be found to have other meanings.

The terms “reification”, borrowed from Latin, as well as “hypostatisation”, derived from Ancient Greek, both essentially mean “turning something into a thing”.

In some publications, these terms are therefore also used as synonyms – often even as the preferred terms – for precisely the phenomenon that this article refers to here as the objectification of human beings.

However, just as “objectification” could also be understood in a general sense as “turning something into an object” (i.e. not necessarily referring to people), “hypostatisation” is used here on this website to refer to the mistaken understanding of abstract concepts as something concrete (Hypostatisation).

The term “reification”, on the other hand, has a different problem: it is also used to describe several phenomena which, whilst related, are nevertheless clearly discernible. To avoid confusion and inconsistencies with other publications, this term was “merely” given a summary entry in the glossary: Reification.

In particular, the term “reification” can be understood to refer to a specific form of objectification, which is that human labour is understood as a necessary resource for the production of goods.

The term then refers specifically to the fact that an object is being produced, and that human activity is reduced to its contribution to the production of that object.¹⁾

Objectification can also be a direct synonym for “reification”. The term is however most commonly used in the context of “sexual objectification” to describe the reducing of people to their sexual aspect.

The most compelling example of this is, of course, the portrayal of women in particular in pornography. The stereotype of ever-willing and always available sexual partners is so firmly established in this context that it could be regarded as part of the genre’s definition. But objectifying portrayals – particularly of women – are also commonplace in advertising, as well as the fashion and the music industries.

In an extreme form of objectification, known as “dehumanisation”, people are no longer seen as human beings. In this sense of the term, humans are described using terms or abstracted to such an extent that they can be denied their human rights.

Political propaganda, in particular of the more radical kind, likes to employ rhetorical or visual devices to portray opponents in a dehumanising fashion. But also social groups (like homeless, prisoners, people of colour, nomads, immigrants, etc.) may also be subjected to such dehumanisation – and treated in an inhumane manner as a result.

Dehumanisation can also be concealed within abstract terms that serve to obscure human life or suffering. The term “collateral damage”, used to describe unintended but accepted casualties of military operations, is an example of this.

In modern societies, there are many reasons why people are regarded as abstractions in one way or another. Some of the best examples can be found in statistics, where aggregated data from entire populations – such as a country or a city – is examined, for instance to compare average indicators or track trends over a longer period of time. In this process, people’s individual experiences are reduced to an abstract figure, behind which the individual people disappear. In itself, there is nothing wrong with this.

In certain situations, it can also be sensible to adopt a more detached perspective towards individuals. For example, an emergency doctor or surgeon, particularly in life-threatening situations, should maintain an emotional distance from the patient in order to be able to make clear and dispassionate decisions. For this reason, a surgeon, for instance, should avoid performing surgery on close family members wherever possible, as it will be particularly difficult in such cases to set aside the emotional aspects. That, too, is not a bad thing.

Even when the management of a larger organisation discusses high-level aspects of human resources, it is usually useful to do so at an abstract level, for example with reference to staff costs or similar statistical characteristics.

It becomes a problem when this abstraction is no longer purely functional and limited to a specific context, but instead people are reduced solely or primarily to certain functions or aspects. An example of this is when employees are reduced solely to their role as workers, rather than being understood as individuals with different life circumstances, abilities, experiences and opportunities for development.

Clearly, there is a moral dimension that makes such objectifications, at least in certain instances, controversial. Most people would certainly not want to be equated with objects, and accordingly, one should not do this to others either.

However, as far as the topics covered on this website are concerned, the moral aspects are less important than the fact that inappropriate reification can easily lead to a mindset that does not correspond to reality. Consequently, decisions may then be made on the basis of this unrealistic mental model, which do not lead to the desired outcomes.

This already applies to the related fallacy in which (abstract) concepts are (mis)understood as (concrete) things (described here in the article “Hypostatisation”). Unlike abstract concepts, however, people have the capacity to act and react. And if they feel misunderstood or even treated unfairly, this is bound to provoke a reaction.

If, for example, a company’s management neglects the human aspects of its HR policy too much, it will certainly soon find itself grappling with problems such as high staff turnover, a lack of commitment among employees, a greater willingness to strike, and many other issues associated with a dysfunctional organisation.

Or, if one reduces potential romantic partners primarily to their role as sexual objects, one is bound to find it difficult to build a meaningful relationship on that basis – or, if this is accompanied by unrealistic expectations of said partners, to find anyone willing to enter such a relationship at all. The modern “incel movement illustrates all too well how projecting oversimplified idealised images onto potential relationships can lead to an unhappy life.

Generally speaking, abstractions can help us maintain an understanding of complex phenomena. However, if one loses sight of the fact that they represent a simplified view of reality, they can also be very misleading. This is particularly true when attempting to use such abstractions to describe phenomena as complex as human beings, who, unlike actual objects, do not passively submit to everything but are capable of actively acting and reacting.

Ironically, the same mistake – having an unrealistic view of reality – can also be made in the opposite direction. When something non-human is understood as a human being or as possessing human characteristics, this is referred to as “Anthropomorphisation”.

• Reification
• Anthropomorphisation

• Reification (fallacy) on Wikipedia
• Dehumanization on Wikipedia