Imagine 1952’s America. A minor writer in a major men’s magazine left his job because he was denied a $5 raise. So he took out a mortgage, pulled some money together, and started a magazine of his own in his kitchen. Little did everyone know, this man was to be the father of the most radical cultural phenomenon of years to come. Yes, we are talking about the man behind the infamous Playboy magazine, Hugh Hefner. Since his death on Wednesday, online media and social networking sites have been flooded with alternating opinions about Hefner.
Hefner’s controversial choice of career as the publisher of the very first adult magazine has landed him an extreme readership indeed. As a result, while the news has been music to the ears of some, a huge number of fans were sad to bid farewell to their icon as well. But who was this man really? Was he just a glorified pimp or someone with a little more depth? Let’s delve into the colou rful and scandalous life of Hugh Hefner and see if it can be confined by labels.
Cartoonist, writer and ultimately, billionaire
Born in the Prohibition era in 1926, Hefner grew up in a household which reflected the puritanical upbringing of his parents- no swearing, no drinking, no playing cards, and no radio on Sundays. Hefner was shy as a child and was disinclined to engage with people. He underwent a psychological evaluation as a child and was tested as a genius with an IQ of 152.
He was interested in drawing cartoons from an early age and drew cartoons for the school newspaper. His affiliation with writing started there and acted as an influence for his noncombatant writing service in the US Army from 1944 to 1946. Hefner completed his major in Psychology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1949. He started his copywriting job for the esteemed Esquire magazine in the early 1950s and left it in 1952.
The first issue of Playboy was published in December 1953 with a nude centerfold of Marilyn Monroe (taken in 1949), and sold over 50,000 copies. In the post-war, uptight USA of the fifties, Playboy stirred up a lot of controversy. But above all, it became a form of escape for America, which was recovering from WWII and the Great Depression. It promised an alternate theme which had been neglected and repressed for too long- sexuality, which was welcomed by the mass of people.
The addition of thoughtful articles and famous interviews elevated Playboy’s status beyond just a pornographic publication. Hefner played a significant role in diminishing racial segregation and establishing gay rights, which in turn proves he was a man way ahead of his time. He is set to be buried next to Marilyn Monroe in Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles. The Telegraph reports that the publisher’s 70 percent ownership of Playboy was valued at $399 million in 1999 but declined significantly due to dwindling magazine sales. Hefner built an empire out of his tiny kitchen, $8000 of loan, and let’s not forget- naked women.
An adolescent in a man’s body
However, Hefner’s depiction of women presented women as mere playthings for men and established a false standard of beauty or rather, sexual appeal for women in men’s eyes. Hefner’s publication has often been accused for creating unrealistic beauty standards (as was Disney’s, as a matter of fact). One of the NY Times readers reacted to his death this way: “My sympathies over his death notwithstanding, as long as we glorify figures such as Hefner, an adolescent boy in a man’s body, males in our society will continue to think being frozen in adolescence is just typical male behaviour. His continued exploitation of young women for sex through his wealth up to his dying day speaks to his character.”
Even admirers of Hefner can find truth in this statement. There’s no denying that Hefner never lost sight of the fact that nothing sold magazines better than naked women, and he never failed to exploit that knowledge.
It’s hard to describe a man like Hefner with an unmixed opinion. Perhaps the most appropriate word for him would be “human”. Maybe he was a legend, maybe a wretch- depends on the eye of the beholder. But whatever Hefner may have been, he’s surely never been ordinary. And maybe that’s not such a bad way to be.
The first issue of Playboy was published in December 1953 with a nude centerfold of Marilyn Monroe (taken in 1949), and sold over 50,000 copies. In the post-war, uptight USA of the fifties, Playboy stirred up a lot of controversy. But above all, it became a form of escape for America, which was recovering from WWII and the Great Depression. It promised an alternate theme which had been neglected and repressed for too long- sexuality, which was welcomed by the mass of people.
The addition of thoughtful articles and famous interviews elevated Playboy’s status beyond just a pornographic publication. Hefner played a significant role in diminishing racial segregation and establishing gay rights, which in turn proves he was a man way ahead of his time. He is set to be buried next to Marilyn Monroe in Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles. The Telegraph reports that the publisher’s 70 percent ownership of Playboy was valued at $399 million in 1999 but declined significantly due to dwindling magazine sales. Hefner built an empire out of his tiny kitchen, $8000 of loan, and let’s not forget- naked women.