Posted on 04/11/2006 7:39:19 AM PDT by Mr. Silverback
The founder of Playboy magazine, Hugh Hefner, is worried about his legacy. In preparation for his eightieth birthday, which he celebrated yesterday, he’s been busily filling leather-bound scrapbooks—1,500 of them—about his life and work. He’s arranged to be entombed next to Marilyn Monroe, the actress who posed nude in the first edition of Playboy in 1953.
According to a Wall Street Journal article by Matthew Scully, Hefner wants to be remembered as a philanthropist, social philosopher, cultural revolutionary. In fact, Hefner wants to be remembered as anything but what he was: a smut peddler, and the exploiter of women.
As Scully puts it with biting sarcasm, “There was a dark and joyless time in America when one could actually go about daily life without ever encountering pornographic images.” And without Hefner’s pioneering vision, “American males could not avail themselves of hundreds of millions of obscene films every year—as they do now.”
The fact is Hugh Hefner did more than anyone else to turn America into a great pornographic wasteland. Kids can now download porn on cell phones and iPods. While riding in their cars, children are treated to the sight of X-rated films on the DVD screens of cars in the next lane.
There’s no longer any doubt that the pornification of America has led to a huge increase in crime against women and children, crime committed by those who consume porn that teaches that women want to be raped and degraded.
And not just women. Hugh Hefner, sitting in his mansion in his bathrobe, thinking over his life, ought to consider the effect of his life’s work on kids like Justin Berry. Berry testified before Congress last week about how he was molested by a predator he met online. Justin spent most of his teen years posing naked online for people who paid to see him perform on camera. And he is far from alone: “There are hundreds of kids in the United States who are right now wrapped up in this horror,” he told Congress.
If Hefner wants to be remembered for his good deeds, he ought to start right now funding programs to help people damaged by his twisted view of sex—programs that help men who are enslaved to sexual addiction. Instead of funding Planned Parenthood, he ought to fund crisis pregnancy centers, which help women who bought into the lie that they were “liberated” only when they became reusable sex objects. Hefner should also help women who were lured into the sex industry and exploited—including those “Playboy Bunnies” he made famous, so many of whose lives ended tragically.
And then, Hefner might fund research into cures for the dozens of sexual diseases, including AIDS, that affect millions who believed his warped worldview—that sexual repression is bad, and that sexual promiscuity is, therefore, liberation and redemption.
The picture of Hefner on his eightieth birthday sitting in his mansion in his bathrobe, in the company of “girlfriends” paid to be there, and his jars of Viagra tablets, is a pathetic, tragic one, and it exposes his true legacy. The lesson: The life lived in pursuit of pleasure and self-gratification leads to nothing less than self-destruction.
Well, I happened to see two young persons watching a DVD in the backseat of the family van when I stopped at Wal-Mart the other day. The flashing pictures of two females in 'action' didn't appear to be the sort of DVD a mother would leave in the van for her kids to entertain themselves with (it was an 'exercise' vid with very scantily clad females of voluptuous proportions). I've actually seen A DVD porn on a screen in a vehicle I passed on the interstate.
coffee spit on screen alert!!!
:)
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A very great man once said something to the effect of, "Men will sin, but woe be to the one who helps them sin." The porn "industry" needs both suppliers and users. Both are guilty.
Good point and I agree. However, I have to ask the rhetorical question: "guilty of what?" Maybe nature is guilty of giving us sexual urges. If porn caused the release of endorphins that made us sick instead of giving us a "good" feeling then there wouldn't be any complaint about porn. BUT, pictures of naked women would still be pictures of naked women. |
"If 1950's Playboy was pornography what the hell do we call the statue of David?"
Wishful thinking???
Heheh.
I have yet to decide whether the Beatles were a symptom of postwar liberalism, or the cause itself. I have always assumed the latter (of course speaking mainly of Paul and John) - that they crafted their communism knowing that people would buy it wholesale. But I could be wrong, perhaps folks wanted such tripe from anyone who would sell it to them.
Anyway, you're right. Hefner was not alone, it was an entire culture of Russ Meyers/Ed Wood/ and many others who built empires by paying women to eagerly exploit themselves.
As an aside- I hold the view that sex will be done anyway, except that people will lie about it. I would personally prefer that this sadness is documented on film in order to educate the hordes of naive men and women who always fall victim to life's cheaters, players, and sluts by their own denial and ignorance. Many who are anti-porn seem to think these are angels who would keep their legs closed, if not for the camera and a paycheck. That is a laughable notion... completely foolish.
It appears like your theory is all screwed up.......
I don't like abortion but I don't see how you can link that to pornography - and like I said I don't even think you can call Playboy 'pornography'.
Actually, Hugh can have a deathbed conversion and still be redeemed, according to some interpretations. Not that I'm suggesting that as a plan.
"We were at the LONG BEACH GRAND PRIX Sunday and Hefner was there celebrating his 80th birthday. We didn't see him. We did see Paul Newman though!"
Paul Newman ... I wouldn't give a nickel to see that A-Hole. Another hollywood lib shooting his mouth off. He can take his "Newman's Own" product line and stick it where the sun don't shine.
The most evil and misogynistic societies on earth (those ruled in accordance with the dictates of the Religion of Peace[tm]) are also the ones guided by Colson's notion that allowing men to view female bodies will cause them to misbehave.
Partly I agree, but I do know that passons can be inflamed and they can be suppressed.
Shalom.
There are stories on FR about incidents of this
Equating what Hugh Hefner did in the 1950s with modern-day pornography, much less even something like Larry Flynt's Hustler Magazine, is absurd.
If anything, Hef is similar to Jann Wenner of "Rolling Stone" magazine fame. A long time ago it was a breakthrough of sorts, but it has long since stopped being relevant to Zeitgeist. Plus, today's Playmates are Photoshopped and siliconed to ridiculous levels.
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| Statistics actually refute your main argument, that porn has led to increased violence against women. While I agree 100% with your statistics and I certainly believe them to be correct, you cannot make the conclusion that porn does not increase instances of rape. Rape may have decreased by 40% instead of 20% if porn did not exist. One simply cannot come to the conclusion that either one is responsible for the other. |
You specifically said "better place." There are lots of men's magazines and will be lots more. What made Playboy different was not the articles, liberal or otherwise, nor the style nor the culture, but the "tasteful" photos. If they had simply been photos of beautiful women, you would not feel the need to qualify them as "tasteful." You have to add that qualifier because the unique addition of Playboy was the nudity.
So I am back to my question. How does the publication of photos of nude women, tasteful or otherwise, make the world a better place?
Shalom.
As for porn, I think the worst thing that has happened to it, is its mainstreaming. Porn will never be !PORN! again, if ya catch my drift...
Used to live in Shreveport. I remember the old drive in on Hearne (Sunset Drive In?) Used to be fun to drive south going home from church.
parsy, who tries to stay pure.
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