PANOPTICISM:

Religion is the most obvious form of panopticism in modern culture, it ticks all the boxes of Foucault‘s idea of a supposed permanently surveilled society consisting of docile bodies conforming to a set of rules through self-discipline as presented by Foucault “The first is that of a pure community, the second that of a disciplined society”. Almost every religion believes in a ‘God’ that created them and everything in their worlds, therefore having ultimate power over them “a real subjection is born mechanically from a fictitious relation”. Then the religion creates a set of rules or laws to abide by and if one considers breaking one of these laws they will be severely punished. However the violation of such a regulation is feared by the individual with no actual scientific knowledge that the punishment will be inflicted upon them as there is no proof of such religious ‘God’. Therefore without actually knowing they are self regulating their actions and thus conforming to the non existent disciplinary power, or to put it simply “he is seen but does not see”. Monk’s and Nun’s take panopticism into a physical dimension by ideologies like celibacy, which Foucault objects to, however has initially stemmed from mental constraint; “(one) should be caught in a power situation of which they themselves are the bearers”.