Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search
49 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
Hugh Hefner Dead At 91.... (Original Post) global1 Sep 2017 OP
Rest in Peace, Hugh. You got me through some awkward years. RandySF Sep 2017 #1
This made me LOL BannonsLiver Sep 2017 #10
R.I.P. dalton99a Sep 2017 #2
Wow, I had no idea he was that old. The Velveteen Ocelot Sep 2017 #3
His Playboy was a big step up from the bra & panty section of the Sears catalog. Kaleva Sep 2017 #4
Good one. Elwood P Dowd Sep 2017 #6
I outgrew Hef a long time ago, but he took the boy out of the Bible Belt and I'm grateful for that. Girard442 Sep 2017 #5
(I only read his mag for the articles............. ) lastlib Sep 2017 #9
Debra Jo. Dave Starsky Sep 2017 #21
Yes! lastlib Sep 2017 #24
I have researched this topic underpants Sep 2017 #31
.... spanone Sep 2017 #7
A man whose sole claim to fame and fortune was the exploitation of women. jcmaine72 Sep 2017 #8
Oh, come now TheMadHatter Sep 2017 #12
No, it wasn't, since it preceded Hustler moonscape Sep 2017 #13
Indeed, it was Playboy before Hustler TheMadHatter Sep 2017 #16
FIXED DemocratSinceBirth Sep 2017 #32
He said "women are sex objects" in an interview. DLevine Sep 2017 #34
If he said "women and men can be sex objects" and sex is healthy he would have been on firmer ground DemocratSinceBirth Sep 2017 #35
Yes, agree. nt DLevine Sep 2017 #36
Do you know when he said that? Orrex Sep 2017 #40
Huffington Post, 2010. DLevine Sep 2017 #41
Yikes! Orrex Sep 2017 #42
You are most welcome. nt DLevine Sep 2017 #43
Hustler is decidedly low brow BannonsLiver Sep 2017 #15
I believe his daughter runs his empire now. cwydro Sep 2017 #19
Passing of a legend bluepen Sep 2017 #11
This message was self-deleted by its author Skittles Sep 2017 #17
Playboy actually had some good articles.. HipChick Sep 2017 #14
December, 1974: "A Real Mickey Mouse Operation" Buns_of_Fire Sep 2017 #18
Yep. Very good. PragmaticLiberal Sep 2017 #20
Its Playboy Interviews were the Gold Standard. Dave Starsky Sep 2017 #22
Now where will Trump get his next wife? imanamerican63 Sep 2017 #23
Just wait. Orrex Sep 2017 #27
Playboy was like everything else... Whiskeytide Sep 2017 #25
All that fast living will catch up with a person jberryhill Sep 2017 #26
Good. That old fart made it acceptable to exploit women on the pretext that the articles SharonClark Sep 2017 #28
Their bodies, their choice. bluepen Sep 2017 #38
That's just 13 in dog years. Orrex Sep 2017 #29
When I was an adolescent boy, I thanked Hefner for showing me stuff. MineralMan Sep 2017 #30
Thank you. nt Ilsa Sep 2017 #33
Got rich selling the idea that women are commodities. WhiskeyGrinder Sep 2017 #37
There seem to be a lot of people on this thread who appreciate the commodification SharonClark Sep 2017 #44
And an equal number of people who view the world exclusively in black and white. BannonsLiver Sep 2017 #49
For one, he gave Dick Gregory the 25,000 reward.... RhodeIslandOne Sep 2017 #45
Oh, THANK YOU, white hegemonic capitalism! WhiskeyGrinder Sep 2017 #46
Wow. RhodeIslandOne Sep 2017 #47
I'll say! BannonsLiver Sep 2017 #48
R.I.P. Hef and thanks for the wonderful memories. oasis Sep 2017 #39

Elwood P Dowd

(11,443 posts)
6. Good one.
Wed Sep 27, 2017, 11:30 PM
Sep 2017

I'm old enough to remember those, and getting a peek at somebody's Playboy magazine was a big thrill back in the 1950s.

lastlib

(22,982 posts)
9. (I only read his mag for the articles............. )
Wed Sep 27, 2017, 11:40 PM
Sep 2017

(But Miss September 1977 was LUSCIOUS......! )

jcmaine72

(1,773 posts)
8. A man whose sole claim to fame and fortune was the exploitation of women.
Wed Sep 27, 2017, 11:37 PM
Sep 2017

Oh...and for wearing those tasteless smoking jackets he thought made him look debonair. He was an unabashed misogynist.

But far be it from me to prevent anyone from mourning the passing of this great humanist who elevated our culture to such stratospheric heights by publishing photos of women he obviously valued as equals and as complete human beings, rather than just a mindless collection of orifices and curvy parts.

TheMadHatter

(29 posts)
12. Oh, come now
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 12:21 AM
Sep 2017

Playboy wasn't Hustler. It was tasteful and high-brow. Cliche aside, it did have a lot of good writers working for it. The beautiful women were the main draw of course, but the rest of the pages weren't filler.

It's OK to admire attractive women (and men, if that's your thing).

moonscape

(4,664 posts)
13. No, it wasn't, since it preceded Hustler
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 12:30 AM
Sep 2017

by about 20 years. It's not as if Playboy entered a Hustler environs and decided to be high-brow ... it's more that Hustler et al took what Playboy was doing and ramped up. For its time though, Playboy was plenty ramped.

TheMadHatter

(29 posts)
16. Indeed, it was Playboy before Hustler
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 12:46 AM
Sep 2017

It still doesn't change the fact that Playboy was tasteful and remained so throughout their run. Even in the 70s and 80s when Hustler and Penthouse were big they stayed true to their format and didn't go into the gutter. They showed naked women, yes, but no spread genitalia or anything else graphic. Additionally, Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, Jimmy Carter, etc, were interviewed or featured in the articles that lent a refined air to the whole enterprise.





DemocratSinceBirth

(99,706 posts)
32. FIXED
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:23 AM
Sep 2017
It still doesn't change the fact that Playboy was tasteful and remained so throughout their run. Even in the 70s and 80s when Hustler and Penthouse were big they stayed true to their format and didn't go into the gutter. They showed naked women, yes, but no spread genitalia or anything else graphic. Additionally, Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, Muhammad Ali, Jimmy Carter, etc, were interviewed or featured in the articles that lent a refined air to the whole enterprise.




Hefner's legacy is complex. We can debate if he objectified women. However removing the suggestion that the naked body is obscene or that sex is for procreation only was a good thing.

DLevine

(1,788 posts)
34. He said "women are sex objects" in an interview.
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:31 AM
Sep 2017

I think we can take him at his word.

I agree with you that there is nothing obscene about the naked body, but objectification of women is about more than that.

Orrex

(63,086 posts)
40. Do you know when he said that?
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:50 AM
Sep 2017

I'm not doubting you at all--I'm certain that he did say it.

But if he said it in 1959, the culture was a lot different at that time than in 2017.


Of course, he probably said it all the time, so...

Orrex

(63,086 posts)
42. Yikes!
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:57 AM
Sep 2017

Well, there you have it. Women are sex objects. Glad that's settled.

He could have really made a statement if he'd said "people are sex objects," but nope. A dinosaur from a (hopefully) fading era.


Thanks for the link.

BannonsLiver

(16,162 posts)
15. Hustler is decidedly low brow
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 12:35 AM
Sep 2017

But I would guess many who would criticize Hefner would say many of the same things about Larry Flynt. They would look like fools in the process given that Flynt has been a dogged advocate for the first amendment and a thorn in the side of the religious right for decades. I've never been one to judge a book by its cover.

Response to bluepen (Reply #11)

Buns_of_Fire

(17,121 posts)
18. December, 1974: "A Real Mickey Mouse Operation"
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 02:44 AM
Sep 2017

Where Disney got enabling legislation passed in Florida that basically made Disney World a fiefdom almost unanswerable to government authorities. How they patiently bought up small plots of land, piece by piece, until they got their 27,000 acres. Fascinating.

I think there were some pictures of nekked wimmen in there too, but being pure of mind, soul, and body, I never looked at them.

Dave Starsky

(5,914 posts)
22. Its Playboy Interviews were the Gold Standard.
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 08:43 AM
Sep 2017

Pages and pages long, full of five-dollar words, with everyone from Don Rickles to Eldridge Cleaver and Fidel Castro, conducted by the likes of Alex Haley.

Great short fiction, too. I discovered JG Ballard and John Irving in those pages.

Yes, some of us really DID read it for the articles! Honest!

Whiskeytide

(4,459 posts)
25. Playboy was like everything else...
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:04 AM
Sep 2017

... some good qualities, some not so good. Not everyone's cup of brandy in a mountain chalet hot tub.

While I was in college in the 80's, my roommates and I found a box in a closet with more than 100 issues from the early to mid 60s. Reading the articles, interviews and humor about the war, civil rights, JFK's assassination, the space race and all the rest from that decade was incredibly cool and thought provoking. Like a time capsule. I probably learned more from that than my studies.

I might have looked at a pictorial or two as well.

SharonClark

(10,005 posts)
28. Good. That old fart made it acceptable to exploit women on the pretext that the articles
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:17 AM
Sep 2017

were serious. What claptrap. There is plenty of serious reading out there that doesn't degrade woman.

MineralMan

(146,192 posts)
30. When I was an adolescent boy, I thanked Hefner for showing me stuff.
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:21 AM
Sep 2017

Later on, as I met and interacted with more and more actual women and women-to-be, I realized how narrow Playboy's view of women really was and dropped it from my list of magazines to pore through.



WhiskeyGrinder

(22,153 posts)
37. Got rich selling the idea that women are commodities.
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 09:38 AM
Sep 2017

Why anyone would be either sad or grateful to him is beyond me.

SharonClark

(10,005 posts)
44. There seem to be a lot of people on this thread who appreciate the commodification
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 10:29 AM
Sep 2017

of women. Such progressives, don't you know.....

 

RhodeIslandOne

(5,042 posts)
45. For one, he gave Dick Gregory the 25,000 reward....
Thu Sep 28, 2017, 10:29 AM
Sep 2017

....to help find the bodies of James Cheney, Andrew Goodman, and Mickey Schwerner, three civil rights workers murdered in Mississippi in 1964.

But yeah....it's beyond you. So carry on.....

Latest Discussions»General Discussion»Hugh Hefner Dead At 91......