An All-American Pastime--"Hef"
Warning: this article deals with issues that are inflammatory. Also, I shall try to present both sides of the equation bad and good. There are aLOT of ‘tell all’ books, and former employees who don’t say good things about their experience at Playboy. I shall try to include these as well as the more positive side of Playboy and Hugh Hefner.
This post also contains erotic pictures, so don’t go any further if you don’t like that sort of thing!
So, who was this man--a feminist pariah? A champion for civil rights? A man who wished to do his part in banishing Puritan sexual attitudes? A man who made sexual objects of both men and women?
Yes, certainly.
He was born in 1926, the child of staunchly Methodist parents. He had one younger brother (who would later join him in his publishing endeavors). Hefner described his childhood as one devoid of public displays of affection from his parents. Sex should never be discussed openly; it was only appropriate in the marriage bed. It was a thing to be hidden.
In high school, Hef began to draw and write a comic, displaying a fictional character (or not), about who had a series of social adventures. In other words, he was creating an image for himself as a popular boy, who knew all about fun.
What is interesting, is that Hef remained a relatively sedate, somewhat shy individual. If you look at these early expressions of Hef's creativity, though, you can see the gradual emergence of the man he would become in later years.
Now, what was the context in which Hef was living at the time? What follows may have little meaning for you for you in this day and age, Dear Reader, but in the age prior to the 1950s, it was literally against the law to see or do certain things (sexually speaking) in public. For example, during the classic age of Hollywood, it was against the Hayes Code (a group of prudes who sat behind closed doors in their hair shirts, deciding what the American public could or could not see) to show a married couple sharing the same bed. Remember Ricki and Lucy?
Yeeaaah. Now, this represents what most married couples were doing. Sure. Of course.
Not.
But, the Hayes commission had a stricture that you could not show a married couple in bed together, without one partner putting one foot on the floor. Or, they had to be in separate beds. Now, let's imagine that this husband and wife were having sex, or a couple was engaging in what was once called "heavy petting." Check this out from Hitchcock's "To Catch a Thief":
But, this was the classic example of how Hollywood handled sex in motion pictures, until the mid-1960s (and some might argue, beyond that time--if you look at the progression of sex scenes in the late 20th cent. For example, it was not until the 1980s, that inter-racial romance became 'alright' to show in a major motion picture--watch Whoopie Goldberg in "Burglar" where she plays around with a SEXY Sam Elliot).
But, I digress.
This was initially the context in which Hefner arrived at by the 1950s. As Hef himself described it: 'time to become your parents.' This was the late 1940s, and early 1950s, where he married his first wife, Millie. With her, he had two children, and a dead end job. He began to stultify, and to decide that the American dream, in its' actuality, sucked.
Okay--this is the 1950s--what was the so-called "American Dream"? One car, one garage, one house, one dog, a mom and dad; two kids. Where did this take place? Suburbia. Always suburbia. And, what did this particular world look like? Do you remember "Fun with Dick and Jane"?
anything strange jump out at you, folks?
Ah, suburbia. Always white--monochromatic. Always with an affluent sheen (even if the family could not afford half of what they had--after all, there was lay-a-way!). Always heterosexual. Always the same values, and a lack of tolerance for alternative sexual identities, or alternative political persona. A nightmare of conformity.
But, what happened if one did things differently?
Well, people usually got pissed off. Joe McCarthy, anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?
And, really, this is what seems to have happened to Hef, over time. He seemed to have a talent for pissing off a lot of people--but then, he also had a talent for pleasing more than he angered.
OK. So what did this man do? Well, if you have to ask that question, then you must be living under a rock. Hugh Hefner, the publisher of Playboy Magazine. Oh! Right! The rabbit, right?
No. That was really a comment from a twenty eight year old I work with. Swear. What made it especially sad, was that although they knew what Playboy was, they had never even heard of Hef. Sigh. Sometimes, I weep for the future.
Back to my story:
So, a puritanical Methodist background, a new wife, and two kids. Hef was working at a dead-end job, and he wanted out. For reference, please watch a film called "The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit." Unbeknownst to Hef, he also wanted out of his settled life. So, what to do? If you don't want to do something drastic like leaving your family, then why not share your beliefs (i.e. rebellion against the American sexual mores of the times--hetero, or bust) in written form? Why not a magazine?
He began to get some input from his friends, and to have their contributions to the evolving project. At first, the budding magazine was called "Stag Party," but, Hef was to find that there was a hunting magazine with a similar name. He therefore, had to find another name--and so "Playboy" was born. It was a 'book' that would be more than an erotic, more than just another 'nudie' magazine. The women photographed would be the veritable 'girl next door.' The librarian. The teacher. The secretary. Message: any woman can be beautiful, In some ways, the early years of the magazine kind of celebrated beauty as well as cultural issues.
It was going to portray a way of life for the urban male. Stereos, and music. Mutual sexual contact. Men and women experiencing each other as fully adult sexual beings. I think you, Dear Reader, might appreciate the revolutionary aspect this was, given the time it was being created--the early 1950s. The height of McCarthyism. I personally think that Hef was not objectifying women, so much as creating a vision of what urban American adults could sexually experience, apart from the repression so rampant in this decade.
The other influence on Hef, was a men's magazine called Esquire. In this magazine, men could see the kind of burgeoning lifestyle that city life could afford them in America. Yes, it was materialistic, and yet.... In Esquire, there was always a centerfold of what came to be known as the "Varga Girls." These were incredibly popular among servicemen during WWII.
Here are some of the Varga girls:
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Isn't this Vargas girl outstanding? Yes! A sexy pregnant woman!! I think this is super cool.
Side Note: In the past, I had several Vargas Girls framed, and placed around my house. I absolutely loved them for the history they represented. What's funny, is that when I got divorced, my ex-husband took these prints (yes, I was horribly angry), and hung them in his bedroom. When he was remarried, he gave me the prints back, as his second wife viewed the prints as pornography! I think such a view is both narrow-minded, and silly, and yet it was a perspective shared by many at the time--even today.
And, so it was within this atmosphere that Hefner was about to launch his magazine entitled "Playboy," Only one thing stopped him--he needed an absolutely fabulous centerfold, and as luck would have it, he was able to secure the rights to a nude photo of none other than Marilyn Monroe! Pretty damned lucky, wasn't it? This is the infamous centerfold, that Hef purchased for a song----
Damn, she sure was beautiful, eh?
Can you imagine? A centerfold that was purchased for an incredible price (I am pretty sure it was in the neighborhood of $500)? Of the most popular actress working in Hollywood? Yeah, it was sweet for ole Hef and his gang of merry conspirators. As you might imagine, the new magazine was a hit from the word go--the first edition sold out immediately, and Hef & Co. were off and running with their new business.
In the early years of the magazine, Hefner was obsessive about every detail, working incredible hours. And, in the due course of time, his marriage to Millie ended--rather amicably as it turned out. But, is there really ever such a thing as an amicable divorce? Hef became an absentee father, paying child support.
As the magazine really took off, combined with his crazy working hours, Hef began (at some point), to take Dexedrine to stay awake. Now, I really cannot recommend 'dexies' as a way to get more work done. But, in later years, Hefner would state that the drug allowed him to craft a business, which in time became a financial empire.
THE OTHER SIDE
Now this is where you really have to plug in the article referenced below by Feminist Gloria Steinem entitled “A Bunny’s Tale.” She did an in depth article by actually getting hired, and working as a bunny. Her experience was not a happy one: she felt objectified, and minimalized. And yet, she also found herself surprised by the varying experiences of the female employees. There was no doubt that this was a high risk job for the bunnies. They couldn’t do anything inside the club, but outside it was anything goes--and this was true for the patrons as well. Inside the club, the women were relatively protected, but....
What were some of the ways in which women's rights' organizations viewed institutions, like the Miss America pageant? Or marriage? Or Playboy?
Well, their opinions weren't very high. And, yet, you have to understand, that a dizzying amount of change had descended on the nation since 1959. Yes, playboy was there to essentially witness the sexual revolution, even had a part in it, one might argue, but it stayed apart from the fight for greater women's rights. Roughly ten years of revolution, war, and civil rights' demonstrations. Oh, yeah, and throw in a couple of assassinations too. There was little room for sedate change in the 1960s. By the time of the 1970s, a distinctly militant form of feminism existed in this country--akin in many ways to the English Suffragettes of the late nineteenth, early twentieth centuries. Thousands of women were rebelling in this country, but exactly what were they rebelling against? Well, symbols for one, like those exhibited by Miss America and Playboy.
In the 1950s, many women were encouraged to get what was called colloquially an "MRS degree." That is, go to college, in order to get a husband. And, just in case you think that this view is mired in the past, check this out:
Freak advocates for women to search for men in college -- and no I don't have to be non-biased. This is my blog!
This is why we have to be careful. We have to negotiate social boundaries, and hold on dearly to the rights that women like Emmeline Pankhurst and Alice Paul won for us. Imagine a world where women couldn't own property. Or refuse their husbands. Or vote. Not great, eh? What about for the men? They had to take complete care of their wives, mothers, and sisters. Oh! And let's not forget the children. Did you know, that in the nineteenth century, if a marriage ended, then the husband automatically got the children? No discussion, no nothing. No investigation of family dynamics, and the fitness of either parent, just pop them into Dad's household, who in turn dictated when the children could view their mother.
In the 1970s, American women like Bella Abzug and Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan advocated for complete freedom, sexually and financially. Also, they brought their guns to bear on something they called the 'white male establishment.' And boy, did they shoot those guns.
There really is no better person to highlight this brand of feminism, than Ms. Steinem:
It is obvious that these were women of great characters, fighting for their daughters. I'm just saying that a bra "burning" (they didn't burn their bras) outside of the Miss America pageant might not have been the best use of their time.
Instead of feminist, why not humanist?
For Hefner, the feminists began to attack him, his lifestyle, and his magazine:
An excerpt from Mike Wallace's "Night Beat," an interview with hugh hefner:
Popular books on the life of this American playboy...
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