Hugh Hefner’s Legacy: The Celebrity Pornographer Turns 80

Breakpoint with Charles Colson ^ | 4/10/2006 | Charles Colson

[MineralMan]

"Why don't you rattle me off a list of the magazines which "published interviews with substantive public figures unaccompanied by nude pictures" that were around in the 1950s and still exist today?"

Harper's
Atlantic Monthly
New Yorker

I could go on, but those are just off the top of my head.

[linda_22003]

Pardon me, I'm on a small laptop keyboard. I mean "en deshabille", of course.

[mombonn]

Bravo, Chuck!

Please add me to your ping list, Mr. Silverback.

[Zack Nguyen]

I found a study done by the Candian Institute for Education on Family, in which they studied the effects of pornography on children which led to deviant sexual behavior for them in adulthood. I haven't read it yet, but you can see it here:

http://www.cief.ca/research_reports/harm.htm

Pornography is quite harmful to a community, in my view. Just like cocaine or heroin, not everyone who takes it turns to destructive behavior. But porn and deviancy do seem to be connected quite a bit.

Hugh Hefner did not birth the porn industry. But it would be fair to say that he brought it to the mainstream, that he made it acceptable and even glorified it.

[Antoninus]

Many works we consider masterpieces were originally considered at least titillating or shocking, if not obscene.

What's your point? My point was that magazines like Playboy allowed ordinary men and boys to have their own private stash of readily available porn, which is enormously destructive both mentally and spiritually. Having a collection of oil paintings of naked chicks in your house was simply not feasible for the average person--and indeed, even a rich guy who did so would have rightly been considered in the same light as the Marquis d'Sade.

Certainly, you can see the direct, straight line down that leads from "scandalous" works of art like Manet's Olympia through "humorous" nudie mags like the early Playboy to utterly vile publications and websites like what exist today in tremendous proliferation within easy reach of the youngest boy with any kind of web savvy.

Celebrating Playboy is like celebrating a way station along the road to the cultural destruction of the Christian West.

[Antoninus]

I could go on, but those are just off the top of my head.

Please do.

I'll bet for each of them, there are a dozen that have gone under.

[Antoninus]

Pornography is quite harmful to a community, in my view. Just like cocaine or heroin, not everyone who takes it turns to destructive behavior. But porn and deviancy do seem to be connected quite a bit.

Ask Jeffrey Dahmer.

Admitting you use and enjoy porn and are proud of it in a public forum is, to my mind, the equivalent of wearing a pot-leaf hat. It identifies you as a loser.

[linda_22003]

I don't see where I did celebrate it, but to equate Hugh Hefner with Osama bin Laden in terms of destruction of the west is a little too melodramatic for me. :)

[MineralMan]

"I'll bet for each of them, there are a dozen that have gone under."

No doubt there are, as have many other magazines of various types. You made the point that a magazine that didn't have naked women in it but included serious articles and interviews wouldn't survive.

I gave you three prominent examples, off the top of my head. To find more would require enough research to see which serious magazines today were being published in the early 1950s. Trust me...there are plenty. You were incorrect in your supposition, simply based on the three publications I named.

Yes, many magazines have folded. That's business.

[wbill]

I would agree that porn had a part in what you're describing, but I'd also say that there were a lot of other pieces playing a role, as well.

I think that acceptance of what you describe is cyclical. Late 60s and 70s were pretty liberal, and the 80s went conservative. Nineties (that's me...) went pretty liberal (sometimes I felt like a lone voice at college). The generation coming up in school now is comparatively conservative, from what I've seen.

I *also* think, that liberalism and conservativism constantly get redefined. For instance, a stance for or against gay marriage in this day and age is pretty much a well-defined point - conservatives (generally) are against it, libs (generally) are for it. In the 60s, the discussion would never even have occurred.

So, does this mean that we're all slouching towards Gomorrah? Not necessarily, IMHO. Society is also progressing in a positive manner - see Civil Rights legislation, greater inclusion of women in the workplace, and so forth. Not withstanding the looney 1% that are constant fodder for discussion here - the ardent feminazis, the Jesse Jacksons, and so forth - I think that society as a whole is *mostly* progressing for the better. Crime is down, divorce rates are down, violent crime is way down.

Unfortunately, illegitimacy rates are way up - that concerns me for the coming generations because society is built upon individual families. It remains to be seen what the ultimate effect of a 'fatherless' society will be, but I can't imagine that it will be good, unless there's a huge backlash (I'm seeing that in the workplace more and more in the past few years...Dads making time for their kids, rather than working the ridculous hours of the late 90s.) I guess that we'll find out.

/random rant off. thx for listening.

[drjimmy]

Pardon me, I'm on a small laptop keyboard. I mean "en deshabille", of course.

Not too shabby!

[linda_22003]

The keys are smaller and so is the screen. I make mistakes that way. :(

[drjimmy]

Kimba Wood????? Wasn't she nominated by Klinton to the Supreme COurt??

No. She was nominated by Clinton for Attorney General. Before that, she was nominated by President Ronald Reagan and unanimously confirmed by the Senate as a U.S. District Court Judge.

[ZULU]

This is a weird story.

[Antoninus]

I don't see where I did celebrate it, but to equate Hugh Hefner with Osama bin Laden in terms of destruction of the west is a little too melodramatic for me.

Melodramatic? I don't think so. Men who embrace pornography are, psychologically speaking, saying "no" to reality and "yes" to a fantasy world. Such men can not be counted on in a time of crisis in the real world.

If you don't think this is a major problem, I would encouage you to look into the articles about that perv at the Department of Homeland Security who was recently arrested for attempting to solicit a minor. Don't for a second think that he's the only one.

[Skooz]

No, there have been plenty of nudes in art throughout history.

Well, yeah. But, with rare exception, the point of the nude art was the glorification of the human form. It was created by gifted artists to uplift the spirit and inspire.

Tittilation was almost always an unintended consequence of the piece.

The purpose of nudes in porn is to tittilate and appeal to the pruient interest, inspiring masturbation.

Art and porn really don't have much in common. Well, except pretty naked ladies. :)

[Hemingway's Ghost]

It identifies you as a loser.

. . . says a publisher of fantasy novels!

[RipSawyer]

If he's an "icon", so is Larry Flynt.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Oh, come on now, compared to Hustler, Playboy looks like a sunday school text.

[linda_22003]

You haven't seen "Olympia", then. Or "Dejeuner sur L'Herbe", among others that caused a morality ruckus in their time. They're classics NOW, but they weren't born that way.

[Antoninus]

You made the point that a magazine that didn't have naked women in it but included serious articles and interviews wouldn't survive.

No, that wasn't my point. My point was that minus the titty pics, Playboy was one of thousands of similar magazines that existed in the 1950s--the vast majority of which are now defunct. Playboy, sans boobage, would have most likely gone under as well.

You were incorrect in your supposition, simply based on the three publications I named.

No, I wasn't. I'm sorry you misunderstood it.