91 years, 1000 women, what's that average out to? - RIP, Hef

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Mendalla

Happy headbanging ape!!
Pronouns
He/Him/His
One of the cultural legends of the boomer era is gone. Hugh Hefner, founder of Playboy, passed away at 91.

Hugh Hefner, Who Built Playboy Empire and Embodied It, Dies at 91

On the one hand, his frankness about sex and relatively liberal leaning (Playboy editorially supported women's rights, racial equality, LGBT rights) certainly played a part in the liberalization of North American culture. And the articles and fiction, jokes about reading it for them notwithstanding, were often top notch writing from A-list writers.

OTOH, while doing so, Hef espoused a lifestyle that was very much oriented to straight, white, affluent males (it's no coincidence that a few James Bond short stories debuted in its pages), so it undercut itself badly at times on some of those very issues, at least in the eyes of those advocating for those issues (e.g. feminists).

Was Playboy a plus or minus in the end? Probably that will be debated a lot in the coming days and weeks.

Was Hefner and Playboy an influence on our culture? Definitely, though that influence waned in the Internet age as Playboy never quite seemed to find its feet online. While boomers and Gen X'ers probably remember Hef well (not always fondly, but well), I wonder if millennials know much more than the image of an old guy in a fancy dressing gown and the rabbit logo. Like many guys my age, I first saw naked women in the pages of his magazine (while reading it for the articles and stories, of course;))and its competitors. I imagine that millennials are more likely to have that experience online.

Bye, Hef. Hope you can liven up that afterlife party.
 
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He was an amoral man who lived a deviant lifestyle. May God have mercy on his soul.
 
Was Hefner and Playboy an influence on our culture? Definitely, though that influence waned in the Internet age as Playboy never quite seemed to find its feet online. While boomers and Gen X'ers probably remember Hef well (not always fondly, but well), I wonder if millennials know much more than the image of an old guy in a fancy dressing gown and the rabbit logo. Like many guys my age, I first saw naked women in the pages of his magazine (while reading it for the articles and stories, of course;))and its competitors. I imagine that millennials are more likely to have that experience online.
I think it's fair to say we know more than that, although probably a big a difference between the 30 somethings and the 20 somethings. We also got shows like the Girls Next Door that I don't know if many Gen X'ers watched. We didn't grow up with the internet, the internet grew up with us. Many of us were teens when we got it at home.

Crystal Harris/Hefner and Kendra Wilkinson are millennials. They would have more a relationship to Playboy than many Gen Xers.
 
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Hefner was a very complex man.

He indeed supported many good and worthwhile causes. As Mendalla notes, women's equality was one of those causes - and yet there was Playboy. I've seen women argue that Playboy empowered women; I've seen women argue that Playboy exploited women.

I have to confess that, like Mendalla (and probably like most men over 50) the first naked woman I ever saw was probably in the pages of Playboy as a young teenager - like Mendalla I was just reading the articles - which were very informative. It always irritated me that one had to flip through so many pictures of naked women to get to them. Is Playboy even still around? I haven't seen much discussion of it in a long time. What I remember of it is that it was pretty tame by today's standards. There are probably PG movies today that are more sexually explicit than Playboy was in the 70's when I was a teenager. I've heard it suggested that Playboy was a sort of "bridge" or middle ground between nude art and pornography, but that it didn't really qualify as either.

And yet at the same time as he supported those good and worthwhile causes he lived what can only be described as a very decadent and hedonistic lifestyle that's the antithesis (I hope) of the sort of lifestyle most of us would encourage our children to strive for.

Strange man.
 
Is Playboy even still around? I haven't seen much discussion of it in a long time.

It is. They actually moved away from explicit nudity for a bit, perhaps thinking to move more into the upscale men's market occupied by magazines like Maxim and FHM (that have scantily clad and occasionally topless women, but not full nudity) but that only lasted a year. Nudity came back this past February.

Wiki history of the changes: Playboy - Wikipedia
 
I heard Playboy moved away from explicit nudity because it wasn't making money anymore; anyone can see nudity for cheep to free online.
 
He indeed supported many good and worthwhile causes. As Mendalla notes, women's equality was one of those causes - and yet there was Playboy.

How can you claim that he supported the cause of women's equality? He published so very many degrading pictures of women.
 
How can you claim that he supported the cause of women's equality? He published so very many degrading pictures of women.

A conundrum that both @revsdd and I mentioned in our posts.

On the one hand, they took a strong editorial stance in support of things like ERA. His daughter ran the company for 20 years after he stepped back following a stroke and he supported other women's careers as well.

On the other, their portrayal of women was definitely sexualised and objectified in the eyes of many feminists.

He was a flawed human being with some very admirable points and some not so much.
 
And God said don't adorn it ... so God must have liked the rye part of the multiple metaphor!

Besides that ... look at all the rye folk on the inside of the roof of the Vatican buildings ... just to amuse the deprived staff of Moses' Muse'n?

The bait for reproduction of a failure in the noble brute needed assistance? Thus the veil was stripped away ... dialogue about relational intercourse is so complex for those numbed to naïveté about it ... a whisper in the right ear will sometimes do it ... sometime the left!
 
A conundrum that both @revsdd and I mentioned in our posts.

On the one hand, they took a strong editorial stance in support of things like ERA. His daughter ran the company for 20 years after he stepped back following a stroke and he supported other women's careers as well.

On the other, their portrayal of women was definitely sexualised and objectified in the eyes of many feminists.

He was a flawed human being with some very admirable points and some not so much.

His actions spoke louder than his words.
 
A conundrum that both @revsdd and I mentioned in our posts.

On the one hand, they took a strong editorial stance in support of things like ERA. His daughter ran the company for 20 years after he stepped back following a stroke and he supported other women's careers as well.

On the other, their portrayal of women was definitely sexualised and objectified in the eyes of many feminists.

He was a flawed human being with some very admirable points and some not so much.
Not much in terms of diversity within the bodies either. Maybe somewhat pushing it slightly at times, but for the most part what was showcased as attractive is what the rest of the media was showing as attractive.
 
Not much in terms of diversity within the bodies either. Maybe somewhat pushing it slightly at times, but for the most part what was showcased as attractive is what the rest of the media was showing as attractive.
Compared to other publications, Playboy is quite vanilla yes
At the time, they were very brave
Tho something like Playboy coming like that into such a blank environment prolly couldn't make it today; there would be such a backlash and shunning etc.

Mel Brooks was interviewed and thinks that his blazing saddles couldn't be made today its so bad with a particular BS having its tentacles everywhere...

What a world we live in
Oy
 
Compared to other publications, Playboy is quite vanilla yes
At the time, they were very brave
Tho something like Playboy coming like that into such a blank environment prolly couldn't make it today; there would be such a backlash and shunning etc.

Mel Brooks was interviewed and thinks that his blazing saddles couldn't be made today its so bad with a particular BS having its tentacles everywhere...

What a world we live in
Oy
Certainly by now Playboy is quite tame. However an argument can be made that by starting to post nude pictures in the mainstream Hefner heloed open the door to Hustler and other much more explicit magazines.
 
Loving this quote, "At the center of Hefner’s legacy is the symbol of the sexual revolution—the shifting in American (and by extension the world’s) views on sex. It is unfair to lay the blame for our culture’s decline in sexual identity solely at the feet of Hefner. At the same time, it is undeniable that his brand has become synonymous in the public consciousness with sexual liberation, inhibition, and meaninglessness." - Ed Stetzer, Hugh Hefner, Mourning, and Legacies: Beyond the Pipe and the Robe

I think that's very well said.
 
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