The public-private distinction as a special relevance to women’s rights: Part I

Concerning pornography, bodily autonomy and consent

Contributions from radical feminists such as Catherine MacKinnon and Simone de Beauvoir have criticised the public-private distinction. They claim that consensually engaging in pornographic production might seem free and empowering, but actually, it perpetuates gender inequality by creating an environment in which women are objectified and have a lower status. The public sphere refers to choices and relations the state has the discretion to regulate, whilst the private sphere includes the choices and relations individuals have the discretion to pursue without interference by the state. By women’s rights, I will be referring to laws constructed on bodily autonomy concerning issues that disproportionally impact all women, such as pornography and domestic violence. I will illustrate this using adaptive preferences. Though Martha Nussbaum's adaptive preferences are of a liberal feminist view, I will use her argument to support the radical feminist view of dispensing the public-private distinction.

Firstly, in section I, I will outline the liberal view that the public-private distinction should be protected because it protects the autonomy of free choices. However, I will counter this by arguing that though pornography can liberate some women in sex work, it does not consider that so-called free choice is made under conditions of restricted choice (due to injustice/inequality). So, while these free choices may seem autonomous, they are actually due to adaptive preferences. I will then consider the objection that adaptive preferences illuminate that everything one believes and desires are adaptive preferences. However, I will argue that the difference is that these adaptive preferences of porn, unlike others, are due to unjust positions/conventions and perpetuate women in roles of disempowerment.

In the following weeks, I will build on the concepts of adaptive preferences bodily autonomy and consent.

I. Theory

The liberals argue that the public-private distinction should be protected because it protects the autonomy of free choices. For example, individuals, including women, ought to be free to watch and participate in pornography, by which they mean sexually explicit material whose primary intention and purpose is to produce sexual arousal in viewers and contributes little, if any, intellectual artistic, literary or political merit to moral and social environments. This is as the liberal principle holds that mentally competent and autonomous adults must not be prevented from expressing their own convictions, or from indulging in their own private tastes simply because, for some, these tastes may be mistaken, offensive or unworthy. In this way, discarding the private-public distinction denies individuals the free choices of their desires in their private homes in which individuals are free to explore and indulge their tastes and convictions. This is as in no way should the state regulate one’s sexual preferences or desires, including in individuals chosen pornography. Hence, the censorship of pornography via state regulations restricts the liberty of individuals against their will. This can restrain women's rights to choose their own means of working, limiting their freedom of expression; however, undesirable other's may find this. However, no censorship of pornography exposes young individuals to multiple forms of pornography that can shape their adult views.

Though pornography can liberate some women in sex work, it does not consider that so-called free choice is made under conditions of restricted choice (due to injustice/inequality). So, while these free choices may seem autonomous, they are actually due to adaptive preferences. When discussing adaptive preferences, I will refer to those preferences which have adapted in such a way as to make them irrational or otherwise unreliable in reflecting out actual attitudes.

For example, some women in rural India give more food to their male family members as there is not enough food to go around and puts up with her husband abusing her as she believes this is something painful but part of a woman’s life. Similarly, young women growing up watching violent porn are limited in their choices of what they enjoy in sex because they may believe this violent porn is what they should be attracted to by mistakenly thinking porn teaches you how to have sex. Moreover, the problem that pornography outlines are that it skewers the broader understanding of what is expected during sex, including around consent, which I will further explore in section III.

Hence, these women learnt to change what they preferred to fit what was available and expected of them in adapting their limited choices in their environment. In the same way, I argue that this limitation of women’s own view of choices available to them seriously impacts women’s rights and should make us question the public-private distinction. In addition to this, young men that grow up watching porn are exposed to the normalisation of abusive treatment of women through the way the porn actors are portrayed and treated. This is especially true as pornography view-ship was twice as prevalent among males (65 per cent) than female Internet users (35 per cent) between the ages of eighteen to twenty-seven in Poland between 2004 and 2016. Such adaptive preferences of pornography do not ensure that these choices are freely made for women watching violent porn or in relationships where their partners watch violent porn.

For example, 31 per cent of the Polish population view violent pornography and such viewings become an adaptive preference intertwined with culture and thus becomes harmful to women. This is significant as the domestic violence rates in Poland are steadily increasing, with 68 per cent of Polish women experiencing violence in their lives. If there were no longer a distinction between the public and private spheres, it would be possible to censor violent pornography with fewer negative adaptive attitudes towards women. This would likely minimise violence against women through adapting cultural values by confronting the issues raised by adaptive preferences. Hence, as Nussbaum would argue, this is an adaptive preference that can be changed with societal pressures.

Adaptive preferences illuminate that everything one believes and desires are adaptive preferences, which is inconsistent with the radical view. In this way, singling out choices about porn production as warranting intervention and ignoring the private-public distinction is unwarranted. The more one examines one's preferences, the more one recognises that one's environment and upbringing shapes most of one' preferences.

For example, one’s choices in haircuts, clothing, friends and partners. This demonstrates that adaptive preferences can be problematic as our thoughts through adaptive preferences to our environment that we make the choices that we make. Moreover, all these preferences being illegitimate is deeply problematic, and it challenges the very idea that all humans, including women, have no agency at all. In this way, censoring pornography and not allowing women to work as porn stars would be limiting their agency and therefore underrepresenting their autonomy of free choices. The worry, therefore, would be that opening up adaptive preferences to state manipulation would lead to state over-control in other areas of life, such as what type of pornography citizens should watch. Again, this seriously limits individual autonomy and freedom of expression.

However, the difference is that these adaptive preferences of porn, unlike others, are due to unjust positions/conventions and perpetuate women in roles of disempowerment. In this way, I argue from the ‘reality-based approach’ supported by radical feminists, that in reality, we do not have equal status. For instance, men viewing violent pornography restricts women's choices and may have long term impacts on them. This is illustrated in the fact that violent pornography gives men a false idea of sex to some extent, as large porn companies do not include intimacy within the porn but focus on the sexual act itself. Hence, violent pornography disproportionately harms women physically and mentally whilst harming men mentally as they will not know how to have a genuine relationship due to the false perception of sex.

Due to this, society ought to acknowledge the negative culture of violent pornography because it has a disproportionate effect on how men and women relate to each other; men not having intimate relationships also negatively affects women. Therefore, we should abandon the public-private distinction as adaptive preferences, such as viewing pornography, causes sexual violence against women. While liberals may agree that the only way for the state to interfere with individual freedom is to prevent harm and coercion of others, it does not recognise that the disempowerment of women is apparent more by the existence of such free choices. Henceforth, we are better off taking a normative stance by women having a quality of life by protecting women from harm caused by adaptive preferences.

In this way, by abolishing the public-private distinction, we need to draw a distinction and say where the line ought to be drawn for the criteria for these preferences that we are to rule being subject potentially from the state. Therefore, I will argue that the state ought to aim to protect women from abuse by focusing on bodily autonomy and consent. This will protect women's rights as, ultimately, the public-private distinction does not classify women's rights as human rights, which is problematic.

Stay tuned for section ii on bodily autonomy.

Find out more:

Charlotte Bunch. “Women’s Rights as Human Rights: Toward a Re-Vision of Human Rights.” Human Rights Quarterly Vol. 12, No. 4 (1990).

Elisha Fieldstadt. “Billie Eilish reveals she watched porn at young age, calls it ‘a disgrace.” Nbcnews. 15/12/2021.

Fernando R. Tesón. “Feminism and International Law: A Reply.” Virginia Journal of International Law Vol. 33, No. 647 (1993).

Johnson. Joseph. “Gender Distribution of Pornhub.com visitors in selected European Countries in 2019.” Statista. 07/07/2021.

Mackinnon, Catherine. “From Pornography, Civil Rights, and Speech.” Communication Law and Policy Vol. 25, No. 4 (1985): 456-459.

Martha C. Nussbaum. Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009.

NFP. “Over 60% of women in Poland have experienced domestic violence, finds leaked report.” 17/08/2020.

Polly Mitchell. “Adaptive Preferences, Adapted Preferences.” Mind Vol. 127, No. 508 (2018): 1003-1025.

Rae Langton. “Sexual Solipsism.” Philosophical Topics: Feminist Perspectives on Language, Knowledge and Reality Vol. 23, No. 2 (1995).

Unheard. “Meet Aella: the intellectual porn-star.” The Post. 15/12/2020.