Bad Faith Example - No Exit Play

I was listening to Sartre explain how in a room that was meant to be hell, there were three people (Garcin, Estelle, and Ines). He said all three had 'bad faith' because their fundemental goal was dependent on others (Garcin wanted to be recognised as couragious, Estelle as beautiful, and Ines as someone Estelle depended on).
My question is: how far can this be expanded? If my fundemental goal is to become a politician is that bad faith because I depend on others to elect me and that is something I do not fully control (due to their free will)? Is it bad faith if my goal is to be the winner of X-factor because it relies on judges? Is it bad faith if my goal is to become a professor because I depend on others to hire me? And evne a self-employed person relies on customers so I am trying to understand how far this dependence on others applies.

Thank you

 

The three examples you listed are emotional needs.I think this is what Sartre meant.That your personal well-being shouldn't be based on the validation of others . Whereas in the realm of relations in the World we are all co-dependent. So maybe Sartre's definition allows for necessary dependence on others.

I don't know. I haven't read much Sartre, and only a little around existentialism.

 

I'd probably need to hear Sarte's full explanation to be more certain of what is meant by "bad faith", as philosophical concepts tend to have very rigid meanings but as a musing based on what you have said, I'll take a guess.

Looking at the examples of the people meant to be in hell and the examples you have gave, a notable difference is that the hell people are seeking validation to their personality, the other people are seeking validation to their (presumably) passions.

The politician example may be a bit of a grey area but for the others, the gig/jobs are not what is fundamental, it's a byproduct or implementation, a passion for music is fundamental before wanting to showcase it on the X-Factor, a passion for teaching is fundamental before the credentials, etc.

So the gist is that the people in these latter examples have discovered themselves : passions, goals, drives and objectives without necessarily relying on others, while the people meant for hell have not.

 

To Sartre, the people living in "bad faith" have allowed others to define their essence instead of taking responsibility for it themselves. My question: Who the fuck cares what Sartre would think of us, even if he were alive? He was simply a self-deluded schmuck muddling through like the rest of us.

 

We're all dependent on each other, on the planet, on animals...on the rain, sun, moon...we are dependent, and I wouldn't want it any other way. Whether we like it or not, even, every living thing is dependent. Some people exploit that for their own selfish gains, but if we just try to coexist with some semblance of harmony, I think the outcome could be epic.

 

Except spiders. I'm not dependant on them.

 

To add to what Okiefreak said, Sartre saw it as a lie to oneself to escape the responsibility of being for oneself. Or as Kierkegaard would have understood it----a lie that avoids the responsibility of being an authentic individual.

Therefore it really isn't a question of what Sartre thought, it is an issue of whether you are being true to yourself, such that you are not allowing others to control or manipulate your life, or even that you are not structuring your life to others such that you hand them control to them even if they do not know it, or use it (such as in the case of someone who does everything for another to get some kind of affection, while the other shows no affection and completely ignores that person).

There is a perfect example of Bad Faith happening in America right now with Angelican Christians supporting Trump despite all the horrible and non-Christian things he does.

To be true to yourself and authentic is to have no masters, and to take full responsibility for yourself, and your choices and actions. And I think that is one of the most important things we can garner from Existentialism.

 

I forgot to add that this does not mean that we cannot, or that we should not work with and depend on others. In fact it points us to a personal responsibility in codependent relationships. Where we are dependent on others, we also have a personal responsibility within that relationship, and if we do not take responsibility for ourselves to do what is right, we have no one to blame but ourselves when that codependent, or dependent relationship breaks down. We can be depndent on others and still be our own master---the problem is that we need to uphold our side of the relationship.

 

There is another side to bad faith---in how we treat others. It is about objectifying others and denying their subjectivity.

For example, if you go to a restaurant and the person that serves you is nothing more to you than a waiter, than you are acting in bad faith. If the butcher is nothing more than a butcher, or a taxi driver is nothing more to you than a driver, than you have objectified these people's own subjectivity and that is bad faith.

In my own case, if I look at all the girls I keep locked up in tunnels under my basement as nothing more than sex objects for my own entertainment, than I too am acting in bad faith. Therefore, I look at them as fellow human beings---humans that provide me with sex everytime I demand it.

Ok---I'M JOKING!! But sex is an interesting subject today because we are living in a time when women are fighting to be treated as equal to men, and take the narrative of sexual objectification as one of the issues of male dominance. Consider the Free the Nip protests---men can walk around topless in public, with nipples for everyone to see, and not be sexualized, while women not only have to be covered in most places in public, but can suffer such actions as being banned from Instagram if they show their nipples. And woe be to the mother who needs to feed her infant from nature's healthiest and best source of infant nutrients. By the same token a women will dress up very nice and sexy with a low cut top displaying plenty of cleavage, no bra, and then she will get upset with some guy because he got enamored with her and couldn't stop looking at her.

The problem is that sexuality is part of our subjectivity. To argue outright that sexualization of the female body is objectification denies our own sexual subjectivity. A topless women can be very arousing sexually, while at the same time a topless women is not necessarily a sexual thing either. What the argument of objectification ignores is that what happens within the mind is purely subjective. You could very well sit on a topless beach in Europe and be more interested in putting on a mask and snorkle and looking for fish and sea creatures than looking at all the boobs that surround you. Then again, you could be sitting there looking at the boobs of the girls that you find attractive. And the fact is, even if you were a guy on a regular beach in the US where everyone is wearing swimsuits, you would do the same thing--checking out the bodies in bikini's and one piece swimsuits, or oblivious to them while you want to go swimming. And you even do the same thing on an all-nude beach. An exposed neck, or an ankle could be sexually arousing where ever you are, or not arousing at all. Nothing changes. In fact, there are some people that are turned on more by a body partially covered than one that is fully exposed.

What happens in the mind is entirely subjective, and no one but you can experience it. It is also true that everything you think is an object. Sartre understood that. Therefore everything and everyone is an object to your subject. While you are likewise an object to everyone else. The fact that you appreciate a woman's body or are even turned on by it is entirely within your subjective right as a human being---a sexual subject. In doing so you are not objectifying that person. On the other hand if you in turn cat called that woman, or tried to force yourself upon her, or made unsolicited and unwanted sexual comments about her, then you are objectifying her--she is no longer an object within your mind, but a material object within the physical world. This is bad faith.

I would therefore add to Sartre's concept of bad faith that there is a threshold beyond which it makes a difference---a threshold from which an intentional object (a thought) turns from a simple object, to an objectified object. There is of course a transition that is a part of bad faith---when the intentional object becomes an objectified intentional object, in other words, when there is an actual attempt to objectify. Therefore a waiter is not objectified simply as serving you as a waiter, despite the fact that you went to a restaurant in part to be served by a waiter. He is not objectified until you treat him as nothing more than a waiter, which inevitably happens after you think of him as such (as nothing more than...). A woman wearing something sexy, even if it turns you on and she sparks your interest, is not a sex object. You also have not objectified her. But once you try to 'push yourself on her' then she becomes objectified. no means no even if she is topless or naked.

Some women get turned on by exposing themselves to others, but this does not mean that they are perpetuating the objectification of women. Other women just feel better and freer in the nude, they also are not perpetuating the objectification of women as sexual objects. Likewise if a guy catches sight of either one, and gets turned on, she cannot blame him for how he feels or criticize him as long as he does not impose himself upon her. Women need to own their sexuality.

 

Someone made this joke somewhere. Like Picasso did rather treat objects like women.