May 19, 2022

"Are we objectifying the sun?"

I overheard a young man say in the presence of 3 other young men as the sunrise looked about exactly like this:

IMG_0605 

I did not hear the other words, so this is a remark out of context, other than the context of the look of the sunrise at that moment. It was 5:35 a.m., and they had to have walked at least 0.7 mile to reach this vantage point. The sun was only faintly visible.

My interpretation is that they'd been talking about the weakness of the sun's display, how the sun was not looking good enough this morning, and it seemed as though they found themselves assuming that the sun ought to look good for them, to serve their interests, so the young man made a joke that drew on some things they'd learned about feminism.

20 comments:

gilbar said...

Don't you be slut shaming My Sun!!!

tim maguire said...

I hope he was joking. But I've heard people worry seriously about how space exploration threatens the environment of the moon and mars, so it's never safe assuming that a thought is so stupid it must be a joke.

rhhardin said...

What kind of object is the sun? - it is the brightest object in the world.

YES, brilliant to such a degree! We have just seen it.

It takes a whole orchestra: drums, bugles, fifes, tubas. And the tambourines and the tympani.

All that to voice a single monosyllable. A single onomatopoeic monosyllable.

The sun cannot be replaced by any logical formula, FOR the sun is not an object. THE BRIGHTEST of all objects in the world is - consequently - NOT - is not an object; it is a void, the metaphysical abyss; the formal and indispensable condition of everything in the world. The condition of all other objects.

The condition of sight itself.

And this is what makes it atrocious. Really the last word in bad taste!

What leaves us really unsatisfied, and prevents us from adoring it: The sine qua non condition of everything in the world is revealed in it, imposed by it, appears in it.

It has the effrontery to show itself!

What's more, it reveals itself in such a way that it forbids you from looking at it, that it turns your eyes back into your body!

Really, what a tyrant!

Not only does it force us to be, I will later say under what conditions - but it forces us to contemplate it - and it nevertheless prevents us from staring at it.

YES and NO!

It is a tyrant and an artist, a fireworks specialist, an actor!

- Francis Ponge "Reading the Sun on the Radio"

rhhardin said...

Women as erotic comes from women's failure to become objects. Otherwise it's not erotic. The mechanism is a shortcut in male wiring. It should not be interesting but it is. It gets an output quality that it does not deserve from the rest of male processing hardware.

R C Belaire said...

Ra smiles.

JZ said...

Your interpretation makes lots of sense. And the guy’s quip made me laugh.

Joe Smith said...

In our defense, the sun's really hot

walter said...

Toxic Helioseismology.
What are the sun's preferred pronouns?

gahrie said...

Isn't the sun an actual object?

TheOne Who Is Not Obeyed said...

Funny, other societies anthropomorphize the sun, but we go one step further by anthropomorphizing and then othering it.

Way to problematize simple sun gazing.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"it seemed as though they found themselves assuming that the sun ought to look good for them, to serve their interests, so the young man made a joke that drew on some things they'd learned about feminism."

They're making fun of some of the things they learned about feminism. Jokes about "objectifying women" are very much part of the Bro's ironic arsenal.

Rollo said...

Ra is cool with that.

Just keep giving him sacrifices.

Gordon Scott said...

Sometimes, your wry pokes just piss me off. And then comes one like this, and all is forgiven.

mikee said...

Sun doesn't care. Sun gonna fusion, out in space, heating up Mercury and Venus before its light even gets to Earth. We aren't even ants under its solar magnifying glass. Sun can't tell we're even here. We're a leftover, a scrap from its formation. Ozymandias wasn't just wrong, his sense of scale was waaaaaaay off.

farmgirl said...

Isn’t it sublime?

farmgirl said...

A love poem.
Pretty cool, rh.

Charlie said...

Or they had been taking drugs all night and this was just gibberish.

Howard said...

Subjectification is more eagleitarian.

Quaestor said...

Red sun at morning. Take warning.

stephen cooper said...

Sad. So so sad.