SuttaCentral
Is there such a thing as objectification in Buddhism? Namely, objectification here means treating someone else as an object for personal gain, or for their appearance, or wealth. However, it means also many other things, so I’ll just leave the question open.
What does Buddhism say about objectification?
In practice of the noble eightfold path which most Western practitioners are engaged in, there has to be objectification, as conditioned phenomena must be used skilfully to move towards the unconditioned, there is no option. It’s only at the arahant level that non-objectification is fully known.
See Anguttara Nikaya 4.174
However the layperson who practises correctly should strive to gain a sense of non-objectification:
His mind heads straight, based on the Dhamma. And when the mind is headed straight, the disciple of the noble ones gains a sense of the goal,"
—Anguttara Nikaya 11.13
Again, with sensual pleasures as the cause, sensual pleasures as the source, sensual pleasures as the basis, the cause being simply sensual pleasures, kings quarrel with kings, nobles with nobles, brahmins with brahmins, householders with householders; mother quarrels with son, son with mother, father with son, son with father; brother quarrels with brother, brother with sister, sister with brother, friend with friend. And here in their quarrels, brawls, and disputes they attack each other with fists, clods, sticks, or knives, whereby they incur death or deadly suffering. Now this too is a danger in the case of sensual pleasures, a mass of suffering here and now…the cause being simply sensual pleasures.
~ MN 13