Friday, December 10, 2010

Why I am Opposed to Body Worlds 2

Alright, enough with the pseudo-philosophizing of the previous post. I disagree with Body Worlds because it assumes that the human body can, at a certain stage of its development or deterioration, become an object purely divorced from its spiritual referent and made to become a mechanism for entertainment. That the person who subjects herself to such a metamorphosis of purposes concedes to this means absolutely nothing to me. Women or men who concede to display the ins and outs of their bodies in pornographic films are no less culpable. They have internalized the objectification of their bodies for the procurement of cash on the basis of the sexual gratification of a stranger, who doesn't even know their first name. It is damnable behavior, all the more so given its concession by the acting subject.

People who tout the Name of God as Creator and claim a renewed appreciation for His handiwork as a result of attending a Body Worlds display miss the point entirely. You see, why not gratefully claim similar spiritually enriching moments in the close and aesthetic viewing of a womans fully exposed vagina or breasts? Is the act of a male penis entering beneath the labia majora any less a work of God's creation? It is more so, given its demonstration of the confluence of actualitas and feeling and psyche and physis and will and telos. These metaphysical components cannot be viewed or properly understood in the inspection of a dead body. Yet the church rightly criticises the modern libertines who invade the privacy of the forementioned putative act so they can get a boner. I launch similar critiques against the Ancient Near Eastern phenomenon of the shrine prostitute which, it may be said defensively, was a pure stimulant for cultic piety. All of this, including body worlds, is pure Eudaemonism. A distortion of the handiwork of God, a de-humanisation of the humanity, and, in the case of those who walk out of the show with the Name of Jesus on their lips, a blasphemy.

2 comments:

Mark said...

You dualists and your hatred of science... :)

Emerson Fast said...

Actually,

A dualist would probably have less of an issue with Body Worlds than a monist. It is, after all, JUST a body right? What counts is the soul.