Relations between Scopophilia and Castration Anxiety

Without men's fear of castration, would scopophilia and voyeurism continue to be such common masculine instincts?

Mulvey's references to psychoanalysis in regards to the precedented dynamics between men and women and the following passage inspired this question.

"But in psychoanalytic terms, the female figure poses a deeper problem. She also connotes something that the look continually circles around but disavows: her lack of a penis, implying a threat of castration and hence unpleasure. Ultimately, the meaning of woman is sexual difference, the absence of the penis as visually ascertainable, the material evidence to the symbolic order and the law of the father. Thus the woman as icon, displayed for the gaze and enjoyment of men, the active controllers of the look, always threatens to evoke the anxiety it originally signified. The male unconscious has two avenues of escape from this castration anxiety: preoccupation with the reenactment of the original trauma (investigating the woman, demystifying her mystery), counterbalanced by the devaluation, punishment, or saving of the guilty object (an avenue typified by the concerns of the film noir); or else complete disavowal of castration by the substitution of a fetish object or turning the represented figure itself into a fetish so that it becomes reassuring rather than dangerous (hence overvaluation, the cult of the female star). This second avenue fetishistic scopophilia, builds up the physical beauty of the object, transforming it into something satisfying in itself" (Mulvey 205).


My stance on this question, and therefore my thesis, is:

When scopophilic and voyeuristic thoughts arise in the immediate presence of a woman, a man is subconsciously attempting to diminish the woman's power in order to escape his castration anxiety. Men visualize women in voyeuristic and scopophilic ideals in order to cater to their phallocentric needs. By materializing women, men are belittling them and their power in order to retain confidence in the face of possible castration.

With the support of:
"The argument returns again to the psychoanalytic background in that woman as representation signifies castration, inducing voyeuristic or fetishistic mechanisms to circumvent her threat" (Mulvey 208).

Some specific passages:

In Snow Crash when Raven sees the clear-minded Y.T. serving fish to the men and women on the Raft he immediately develops an interest in her. Not only has she managed to escape the brainwashing of the drug Snow Crash, but she is also not visually intimidated or embarrassed in his frightening, established presence. In order to keep her recognizably strong character in check, Raven immediately begins to court her to prove to himself that he has power over her and that there is no threat of the castration of his male dominance. When Y.T. asks, "'So, uh, do you want me to serve up some fish, or are you gonna stay hungry?' The big Aleut stares at her for a while. Then he jerks his head sideways and says, 'Come on. Let's get the fuck out of here'" (320).

Another instance of sexual thoughts or actions in response to
Another instance where men's fear of power limitation leads to sexual thoughts or actions is the form of torture Lt. Thorne uses on Cylon prisoners seen in the episode Pegasus of the the television show Battlestar Galactica. In this episode, Thorne is introduced as the Cylon interrogator, but he does much more than question the captive Cylons. Because of the threat Cylons pose to Thorne and the human race in general, Thorne feels he needs to abuse and rape the two women in order to prove his power over them to himself. Thorne needs to prove this power in order to successfully disregard his anxiety over the castration of his power of which the two Cylon women are capable. Thorne's need is first exhibited with the reveal of the Pegasus captive Number Six Cylon and her frail and beaten condition. Later, we see Thorne attempting to exterminate his fear of castration again when he tries to beat and rape Sharon, a Galactica captive Cylon. In both of these instances, Thorne's fear of the dominance of the Cylons and therefore the castration of his power leads him to sexual violence. Furthermore, the guards assigned to protect Lt. Thorne throughout his "interrogations" take voyeuristic pleasure in Thorne's abuse of the Cylons. Not only does the physical limiting of the Cylons' power please Thorne, but it pleases the men who witness it because it lessens their fear of castration as well.

A further look into each of these characters' reactions to castration anxiety will be taken in the paper itself. These two instances are glimpses into the general idea of the argument I will be attempting to make in my paper.