Not that simple

My oldest is taking a photography elective in our homeschool co-op this semester. The class is creating a yearbook for us.  Last week, the teacher discussed how photographing people can be honoring of their God-given humanity and enrich the community — or it can be exploitative, reducing them to something less than human.

A few days later, we found ourselves at a restaurant with televisions broadcasting an all-star basketball game. An avenue of young women, as scantily clad as possible, flung themselves around provocatively as the athletes, one at a time, jogged between them to the court.

You could have one of several responses to that. You could lament the moral decline of our culture. You could laugh at the absurdity of the spectacle.

Or you could be sad.

Each one of those young women was someone’s little girl. They were fed and had their diapers changed. They played with toys bought specially for them at Christmas. Somewhere, there’s probably a school photo with a missing front tooth. Each of them were cared for as they grew.

But in that setting, they were reduced to generic females; reduced further to bodies; reduced still further to one of the many complicated traits and potentialities of their bodies. They were mere window dressing.