Dilemmas of dating: The case of aprioristic sexual lookism

Over the last decade, "sexual racism"—that is, discrimination in dating based on racialized group membership—has increasingly attracted scholarly and public attention (Bedi, 2020; Clarke, 2011; Liu, 2015; O'Shea, 2020; Sonu, 2015; Zheng, 2016). Taking a cue from such a debate, some commentators have recently turned to discrimination based on physical appearance in dating—hereafter, sexual lookism—with some claiming it is morally problematic as well (D'Alessandro, 2022) and, in fact, unjust on multiple counts (Midtgaard, 2022). Sometimes a face will pop up and you're like, "Oh, that's so unattractive." And then I think: "Oh my god!" I don't want to be that person who treats human beings like commodities … I feel like the lowest common denominator when I treat people like they're just how they look. The paper investigates such arguments' prescriptive implications regarding individual dating conduct. Namely, assuming such arguments are correct, should individuals try and date others, refraining from immediately ruling them out based on their physical appearance only? In a nutshell, the paper shows that even though there are pro tanto deontic reasons not to engage in ASL, their action-guiding force is, all things considered, limited at the level of individual dating conduct. By drawing on sociological research about dating as a Western social practice, the paper shows that trying to date others when deontic reasons have major weight in practical deliberation is disrespectful toward would-be dates in its own right. If so, opposing reasons need to be balanced against each other; it emerges that lookist daters are best seen as facing prohibition dilemmas since they are neither morally allowed to engage in ASL nor to try and date others primarily "out of duty." Reaching such a conclusion—and doing so via the paper's central strategy—contributes in multiple ways to the egalitarian literature on dating discrimination. First, the paper vindicates an important intuition—that is, that, when dating, being motivated by deontic reasons is morally problematic from the very perspective of selected would-be dates.2 Despite being touched upon in the literature, this intuition has yet to receive a proper (successful) philosophical defense.3 Crucially, without such a defense, the tendency of mainstream literature to sideline the realm of individual dating conduct as a potentially fruitful site to counter dating discrimination should make us pause. Consider, indeed, how the dominant—and, until very recently, only—focus has been on structural remedies—for example, the regulation of dating environments (e.g., Bedi, 2020; O'Shea, 2020)—or long-term cultural change—for example, via deliberative duties to reflect on, and possibly revise, biased sexual preferences (e.g., Cahill, 2016). These are extremely important proposals. Still, altering dating conduct may be more feasible for individuals than effectively supporting structural transformations. It could also potentially make a shorter-term difference compared to (likely) long-term and complex processes such as freeing our sexual preferences of problematic social biases. Further still, it is critical that sidelining individual agency does not ultimately collude with underlying urges to deflect personal forward-looking responsibility for social change in a domain of action in which we highly cherish acting as we see fit. Hence, the significance of carefully assessing that questions about individual duties to alter dating conduct are not unwarrantedly sidelined. To such an end, the paper provides a philosophical defense of how "dating out duty," as it were, is wrong rather than taking the intuition at face value. In fact, the paper takes the investigation an additional step further. It takes seriously the plausible—yet uncharted—possibility that following deontic reasons when dating, however problematic, may still be the best course of action, all things considered. By showing that this is not the case, the paper ultimately strengthens the case for the centrality of structural and cultural remedies to ASL. At the same time, the paper speaks to very recent proposals that make the opposite, equally hasty, assumption in their attempt to identify moral reasons for individuals to refrain from ASL—that is, that individual dating agency unproblematically counts among the appropriate sites to contrast (lookist) dating discrimination. As I will show, a shortcoming of this second, burgeoning body of literature is that it neglects that dating is a social practice. Still, adopting this perspective is crucial as it allows us to see how attributing a motivational role to deontic reasons in dating decisions is morally problematic. By doing so, the paper additionally shows that well-established analyses of how problematic status hierarchies sustain objectionable dating discrimination must be complemented by equally careful analyses of dating as a social practice. The paper unfolds as follows. Section 2 presents reasons for individuals to refrain from ASL. Section 3 defines dating and explains the normative import of reframing it as a social practice. In Section 4, moral reasons to refrain from ASL are balanced against those pulling practical deliberation in the opposite direction, and it is explained why lookist daters face prohibition dilemmas when making dating decisions. Egalitarian theorists have recently proposed several reasons why ASL is wrong. For the sake of the broader argument, I shall briefly present the most compelling ones to show their plausibility. First, ASL can be seen to contribute to unjust distributive arrangements from a luck-egalitarian perspective. Second, some argue that ASL is disrespectful. As I will show, this second claim should be specified in two ways. On the one hand, ASL can be disrespectful because it expresses a demeaning social message. On the other hand, ASL can be seen as intrinsically disrespectful qua wrongfully objectifying behavior. The opportunity to be in adult intimate relationships—hereafter, narrowly construed as sexual or romantic only—has recently attracted unprecedented attention. For instance, Sonu Bedi has argued that the two major frameworks accounting for the distribuends of egalitarian justice—that is, John Rawls's primary goods and Martha Nussbaum's capabilities—also include the opportunity to be in adult intimate relationships (Bedi, 2020, 123–8). For simplicity, I will focus on the former to sketch the idea. In the Rawlsian tradition, primary (social) goods are "things citizens need as free and equal persons." (Rawls, 2001, 58). These are goods that generally enable any individuals to develop and live by their conceptions of the good life, unlike preferences or desires citizens develop based on their own conceptions. The general idea is that while "intimacy is an opportunity that an individual will tailor to his or her own idiosyncratic conception of the good," most adults tend to value the possibility of being in intimate relationships—be them romantic, long-term, commitment-based relationships, or casual, short-term interactions, and "hook-ups"—whatever else they want (Bedi, 2020, 125). If Bedi is correct that such an opportunity is a primary good on a par with, for example, employment or educational opportunities, from a Rawlsian perspective, a principle of fair equality of opportunity should regulate its distribution. Still, the reality of real-world, racialized online dating falls far short of this ideal. For instance, evidence shows that in Western countries, Asian men have significantly fewer dating opportunities in online dating environments than others, with white men having the highest contact rates (Bedi, 2020, 114–8). Very briefly, even though no formal restriction is present—for example, anti-miscegenation laws—Asian men as such are unfairly disadvantaged when dating. Being Asian and presenting as men constitutes an intersection of factors that systematically single out some for unfavorable differential treatment compared to others, negatively affecting their opportunity to find intimacy. Such an argument can easily be extended to the case of ASL by adopting a luck-egalitarian framework to account for its unfairness (Midtgaard, 2022). From this perspective, it is unjust that individuals' shares of primary goods are affected by factors outside their control. To the extent that one's physical appearance is outside individuals' control—or particularly costly to change—it counts as morally arbitrary analogously to racialized group membership. Ruling out a priori someone as a potential date because of elective appearance traits—for example, prominent tattoos—need not be morally problematic. In contrast, appearance traits that cannot be modified—for example, instances of facial scarring or short height, a typically disadvantaging trait for men—or modified only at high costs—for example, fat—will pose a moral problem. ASL raises concerns in terms of respect in (at least) two ways that should be kept analytically and normatively separate but have been conflated in recent literature. Namely, ASL can be disrespectful by expressing a demeaning social message—that is, that those with certain appearance traits are social inferiors. Call this the "expressive-disrespect" argument. Differently, ASL can be intrinsically disrespectful by instantiating wrongful objectification in and of itself. Call this the "intrinsic-disrespect" argument. The general claim is that, ceteris paribus, deciding how to treat others based solely on their physical appearance is disrespectful.4 According to Søren Flinch Midtgaard—who recently defended this view—if we are to respect others we ought to "look behind … "how they look" (Midtgaard, 2022, 3). When dealing with others, we ought to "look behind external titles" such as, for example, what job they have, their wealth, or—more to the point—their appearance traits (Midtgaard, 2022, 10). For instance, when a stranger asks for our assistance, we should not decide to lend support based on such external titles. When we must aid strangers, this is required irrespective of nobility titles or degrees of beauty. The same straightforwardly holds in more formal contexts. All else equal, it would be disrespectful of hiring committees to count applicants' appearance in determining job appointments.5 Critically, it is not self-evident that the same logic extends to the case of intimate partner selection. The latter seems a paradigmatic case in which appearance may count as a sort of "bona fide qualification" without disrespecting others. Still, Midtgaard purports to show precisely that at least certain ways of doing so—paradigmatically instantiated by ASL—are ruled out by a commitment to equal respect (Midtgaard, 2022, 12). As anticipated, we should distinguish two specifications of this general idea. The first perspective can be framed in broadly relational egalitarian terms. In a nutshell, ASL is disrespectful to the extent that it expresses a demeaning social message—that is, in virtue of certain physical appearance traits, certain people are 'not dating material.' From this perspective, ASL both draws on—and at once reinforces—a socially established link between specific (stigmatized) appearance traits and social inferiority. Two moves are essential to this argument. First, we must look at dominant status hierarchies within a given social context to assess when discrimination in dating is disrespectful. Secondly, it is critical to consider not only how sexual preferences are heavily shaped by cultural factors but also, more importantly, how their meaning is socially determined—that is, independently of how individuals subjectively perceive them (more on this below). In a nutshell, the argument concerns the meaning that ASL can express when addressed by, say, good-looking and thin individuals (i.e., "superiors" in the socially dominant beauty hierarchy) to individuals bearing stigmatized physical appearance traits (i.e., "inferiors").6 I will draw on the case of fat since widespread fat stigma in Western countries makes it an especially illuminating example.7 In the words of fat activist Aubrey Gordon, "anti-fatness is like air pollution. Some days we see it; others, we may not. But … we are always breathing it in" (Gordon, 2020, 111). In short, far from constituting a morally innocuous category to differentiate people, fat places people in different positions within a social hierarchy that affects their lives significantly. The disadvantages range from material ones—for example, lower average income than thin counterparts (Berry, 2016, 24)—passing through demeaning stereotypes questioning fat people's moral capacities for autonomous agency—for example, widespread narratives depicting fat as the result of lack of self-mastery and control—to grave epistemic injustices—for example, decreased credibility when reporting sexual abuse in virtue of their socially sanctioned "sexual undesirability" (Gordon, 2020, 109–13). Furthermore, fat stigma—a late-Modernity phenomenon—has by now its own (relatively recent) history. It is at the end of the 19th century that fat starts being systematically construed in dominant medical and evolutionary Western discourses as a marker of inferiority, characterizing the "uncivilized body"—for example, black, or working-class bodies. While initially serving as a tool in sanctioning white supremacist ideologies, fat has since taken a life of its own as a marker of inferior social status (e.g., Farrell, 2011, Ch. 3; Strings, 2019, Ch. 3). What matters for the present argument is that—in social contexts where fat people are systematically construed as "categorically undesirable" (Gordon, 2020, 112)—thin people's aprioristic refusal to date fat people has the power to send a message to those who are rejected (and, potentially, those around)—that is, that, in virtue of their fat, they are "undatable." Notably, the reverse cannot hold. A fat person's aprioristic refusal to date thin individuals cannot send a comparably demeaning message. Within the relevant social context, it is simply impossible for such a refusal to sanction thinness as a trait disqualifying them as potential dates. While fat is a marker of inferior social status, thinness is not. Fat individuals' low standing as potential dates is part and parcel of Western romantic and sexual culture; ASL reiterates this message. Notably, ASL is demeaning irrespective of whether refusing agents intend to demean those rejected or, for that matter, whether the latter feel demeaned (though both are plausible factual possibilities). One can easily imagine that at least some individuals bearing highly stigmatized appearance traits are so used to ASL that they do not feel demeaned by it—for example, by experiencing feelings of inferiority or other negative affective states as a consequence. What matters here is how ASL is "objectively" demeaning—lowering certain individuals' status qua members of a stigmatized social group—not "subjectively" demeaning—for example, making them feel inferior or hurt.8 Note one last point before moving to the second sense in which ASL and respect are in tension. In the expressive-disrespect argument, ASL's disrespectful character depends on background inegalitarian status hierarchies. Since ASL would not be wrong in a social context where beauty standards did not ground problematic status hierarchies—for example, based on fat—this argument cannot explain what is intrinsically wrong with ASL. The second sense in which ASL is disrespectful properly vindicates its intrinsic wrongness. From this perspective, ASL instantiates wrongful objectification (Mason, 2023, 139–41). Descriptively, objectification means treating others as something they are not—that is, objects. Two features of influential analyses of objectification will help unpacking the argument (Nussbaum, 1995; Langton, 2009, Ch. 10). First, objectification need not always be wrongful. To determine whether objectification is wrong, we need to look at relevant interactions in their entirety. Put differently, treating others as objects need not be morally objectionable; treating them merely as objects is. Second, objectification takes multiple forms. For instance, "instrumentality"—that is, treating others as means to ends—does not exhaust the phenomenon (despite being perhaps its most paradigmatic instance). The relevant dimensions to explain how ASL objectifies are (a) fungibility and (b) reduction of others to their body and/or physical appearance (Langton, 2009, 228–29). Recall that, in cases of ASL, disliked appearance traits pre-empt otherwise compelling cues for entering dating interactions with others. ASL instantiates (b) as the lookist agent looks at the other uniquely as a body—that is, an object with a physical appearance—and regulates their behavior solely based on such a perception. Notably, one of the testimonies quoted in the opening accurately grasps the point (i.e., "then I think: … I don't want to be that person who treats human beings like commodities … like they're just how they look"). Fungibility—whereby an agent "treats the object as interchangeable with other objects of the same type"—is another relevant dimension (Nussbaum, 1995, 257). Acting on lookist pre-emptive reasons when dealing with potential dates is not only a way of relating to them solely as objects, uniquely bearing aesthetic (dis)value. It also means relating to them as tokens of an aesthetic type that is disliked (or, for that matter, liked). Hence, what makes ASL intrinsically wrong is that the agent disregards any feature or characteristic that makes the other, appropriately, the individual person that they are—apart and beyond their appearance "if a certain label fits the surface of a given person representing a feature that they dislike" (Midtgaard, 2022, 12). Deliberating about how to treat others based on their "aesthetic value" only is to treat them as mere objects of the physical world rather than multi-dimensional, complex individuals with human dignity. Even if the three presented arguments are correct, do they (at least pro tanto) guide individual conduct? The intrinsic-disrespect argument unproblematically applies to individual conduct since interpersonal interactions constitute a paradigmatic context for the application of an injunction not to objectify others wrongfully. As the latter is an important dimension of liberal ethics cent red around respecting others as moral equals, it is not particularly controversial that a pro tanto reason for individuals to refrain from ASL follows. There is broader space for disagreement on whether the other two arguments—that is, the luck-egalitarian one and the expressive-disrespect one—provide norms to guide individual dating conduct. Addressing whether egalitarian principles and norms uniquely apply to society's main political and social institutions or should also extend to individual conduct falls outside the possibilities of the present analysis. However, an influential strand of egalitarian theory has long rejected Rawlsian-inspired restrictions of the application of principles of egalitarian justice to major social institutions only since private interactions and decisions also play a considerable role in sustaining inequality (e.g., Cohen, 1997). From this perspective, both the luck egalitarian and relational egalitarian arguments could support a norm for individuals to refrain from ASL as part of an "egalitarian ethos," without which a society of genuinely moral equals cannot obtain, irrespective of the virtues of its major institutions (for a recent discussion, e.g., Midtgaard, 2022, 14–15). Whether the reasons presented in this section should also guide individual dating conduct, all things considered, is a point to which I return in Section 4. For now, I shall explain what thinking of dating as a social practice means and how it allows us to identify reasons against acting out of duty when making dating decisions. Let us start from the few available philosophical definitions of dating and test their adequacy considering empirical research.9 John Rawan and Patricia Hallen define dating as "the process of exploring, investigating, and gauging the possibility of eventually reaching "commitment" with another person" (Rowan others seek different types of relations, either occasional or more long-term, including sex and emotional involvement or not (Reid et al., 2022). Hence, the restriction Rawan and Hallen build into their definition is unwarranted. Still, not anything goes. Whatever individuals' precise end goals, a romantic and/or sexual overtone appears to be a generalizable factor distinguishing dating from other interactions (Mongeau et al., 2007). Lastly, dating can take place in person or virtual environments and consist of a process or single events. A single lunch is an instance of dating, even if the parties never meet again afterwards. At the same time, the widespread reality of online dating suggests we should avoid restricting the concept of dating to only (in-person) single events (Hobbs et al., 2016). a short- or long-term interaction that individuals engage in together to get to know each other better and explore whether each party's sexually and/or romantically connotated goals can merge. In Sally Haslanger's words, "to identify something as an instance of a practice is to situate it within a web of social meanings" (Haslanger, 2018, 236). That is, looking at dating as a social practice allows us to focus on elements of the "cultural schema"—that is, "the cluster of concepts, beliefs and norms that allow coordinated action and the organisation and interpretation of information"—to which specific interactions conform, and in virtue of which they are identifiable as a unified social phenomenon in the first place (Haslanger, 2015, 5). For analytical purposes, different elements of social practices can be grouped under broader categories (Reid et al., 2022, 2). First, practices have social meanings—that is, the "embodied understanding of the symbolic significance of the practice." Additionally, to participate in practices, individuals require "competencies"—that is, the "understanding and know-how needed to carry out the practice." The two points are tightly related. As competent participants in social practices, agents will have internalized numerous components of cultural schemas—for example, social beliefs and expectations about the practice and norms governing it—to adjust their behavior and appropriately interpret that of others. The previous section already outlined elements of the cultural schema of dating in Western cultures—that is, racist and lookist attitudes. While these have been (rightly) given center stage in the literature about dating discrimination, components of the cultural schema that distinctively pertain to the social meanings of the relevant interactions qua dating have been thus far largely ignored. As I will show, this is unfortunate as a nuanced analysis of individual duties in the context of dating interactions also needs to be sensitive to such social factors. Rental—Jill, a young professional highly invested in her career, devotes little time to her romantic life. Still, she enjoys showing up accompanied to social events and going out on "romantic dinners." She routinely purchases the services of John, a professional boyfriend working at an agency providing intimate relationship surrogates. Throughout their interactions, they get to know each other better and enjoy each other company. To illustrate, both Jill and John—as competent participants in the practice of service exchanges—will be enabled to make socially informed inferences concerning the behaviors as well as main motivations prompting the other to interact. By assuming, say, that John's primary motivation to interact is his professional commitment to delivering his service, Jill will expect him to be charming and be well-dressed and groomed (assuming this is how he marketizes his professional persona). John, likewise, will expect Jill's motivation to lie primarily in her desire to make use of the service she has purchased. Critically, I aim to show, the presence of such socially informed expectations regarding each other motivations as social practices' participants can bear implications for permissible moral behavior. Indeed, consider again the example of polyamorous dating. As seen above, many individuals increasingly report being involved in dating couples. When conceptualizing dating, we may need to reject as unduly underinclusive a definition of dating as necessarily dyadic. However, as a social practice, participants' expectations are formed under a cultural schema within which a dyadic interaction is (still) the predominant expectation. In this context, polyamorous dating constitutes a significant departure from the rules of the dating game. This does not mean, of course, that there is anything normatively problematic with polyamorous dating (or that polyamorous dating is not properly dating). However, again, the fact that it is socially implicit that monogamy regulates dating has implications for how individuals ought to behave when dating (more on this below). The social expectation relevant to explaining the wrongfulness of acting primarily out of deontic motivations in dating is another one. In short, as competent participants in the social practice of dating, daters will have a reciprocal expectation about the primary motivation prompting one another to interact—that is, each will expect that the other's interest toward them is the primary reason motivating the other's interactional bids.10 Notably, as sociologist Eva Illouz has documented, that the "architecture of romantic choices" in contemporary times is structured around similar beliefs about others' motivations—and our centrality in them—is essential to make sociological sense of the unprecedented weight that romantic and sexual bonds have in sustaining contemporary individuals' sense of self-worth. This is because, under the specific form taken in our time by "affective individualism"- whereby standards for partner selection are seen as internal to the individual, for example, what we feel and think about others, rather than external, (say, whether potential partners meet parental requirements, Illouz 2012, 111–24)—"being chosen" as intimate partners becomes a highly individualized matter; it is thought to be about us, for what we are or fail to be. Crucially, dating rituals—for example, flirts, displays of interest, dating requests, and exchanging phone numbers—are the mediums through which such highly individualized validation most of us seek from others is "bestowed upon us" (Illouz 2012, 113). Therefore, we should assume that (socially competent) parties to such interactions enter them, minimally, with a reciprocal expectation that the main motivation to do so is the interest that each has elicited in the other. The central point here is that accepting someone's interactional bid when the primary reason to do so is, for example, recognizing a deontic reason not to objectify the other constitutes a significant departure from core elements of the cultural schema informing the social practice of dating. Put differently, as competent participants in dating practices, daters would not expect deontic considerations to play any role—certainly no major role—in others' decision to date them. A similar deviation from social expectations—while per se morally neutral (more on this below)—has moral implications once intersected with a moral injunction not to act deceitfully. Or so I shall argue. Before doing so, I will briefly discuss an argument defended by Megan Mitchell and Mark Wells, according to which trying to date others to counter unjust social hierarchies wrongfully objectifies would-be dates (Mitchell & Wells, 2018, 949–50). This discussion matters as both the argument's strengths and shortcomings are instructive. After making sense of both, I will propose an alternative that vindicates Mitchell and Wells' conclusion but generalizes it. Namely, I will show that trying to date others out of deontic reasons in general is wrong. While defending a version of the expressive-disrespect argument presented above, Mitchell and Wells argue that individuals ought not to try and date others in order to counter racist status hierarchies because doing so would be disrespectful qua objectifying toward the latter (Mitchell & Wells, 2018, 949–50). They ask us to imagine a popular high school student who recognizes it is unfair that some fellow students are romantic outcasts because they are "low" in the high school social hierarchy. To counter such a hierarchy, the student decides to try and date them. For Mitchell and Wells, the student's conduct is wrong because they treat their dates as objects, that is, instrumental to promoting an egalitarian ideal. Note an important point. Mitchell an