I'd been going on about how Hugh Hefner wasn't very masculine: The image he created for himself — for viewers of the magazine to identify with — was as a man who spent all his time hanging around the house, listening to jazz, wearing pajamas. He didn't engage in traditional masculine activities like sports or working on the car. He hosted parties. Did he do anything outdoorsy? Was he ever outdoors in the daylight? I can only picture him outdoors after dark at his swimming pool, which was itself designed to have an indoors, a "grotto." That was some outré interior decoration — a grotto.
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Time for me hop on my mt. bike. Back in a few.
Pajamas and a pipe. Beta male
"...was as a man who spent all his time hanging around the house, listening to jazz, wearing pajamas. He didn't engage in traditional masculine activities like sports or working on the car."
Right, real men act like kids and poor people, they don't spread their seed.
Sheesh.
The image was an affectation of aristocracy or nobility. Hef's pretending could be viewed as Pajama Boy-ish but the affectation itself was not.
"Right, real men act like kids and poor people, they don't spread their seed."
The inner city guys who have 8 kids by 8 different baby mommas agree with PB that "spreading their seed" is the sign of a real man.
That's the real toxic masculinity that ensures those kids will remain poor.
That grotto seems so...grotty.
I can't imagine the body fluids that have gone down in that water. Groooooooooss.
"Beta male" The story of Hef's life: the beta male as PUA.
Pants, someone here posted a link to a story about a guy who attended a party there within the last few years and took pictures. Toilet paper rolls stacked up on the vanities. 70's furniture. Stains on the carpeting.
I've been in Great Houses in the UK which were a bit worse for wear and yet were still beautiful after centuries. The Playboy Mansion looks sad and crappy and tacky after, what, 40 years?
Aristocracy is the right call. Or perhaps royalty.
People would come to him, looking for approval, favors, or simply to let it be known that they were worthy of being there. He kept an open house, a court.
The model is the Versailles of Louis XIV, or more accurately maybe the isle of Capri under Tiberius.
There is no need for some proletarian or even aristocratic physicality.
"Toilet paper rolls stacked up on the vanities. 70's furniture. Stains on the carpeting."
You need a proper staff for a palace.
Seems like his income suffered a decline.
Meade,
"Time for me hop on my mt. bike. Back in a few."
Presumably you wore a "helmet" along with your silk pajamas?
He had sex with lots of women. Many consider that a masculine activity.......,In Hefner's world everything was a consumer experience: sex, music, food, clothes. The point of the game was to demonstrate good taste, not high morals.......He certainly succeeded in having a pleasant, comfortable life. That's extremely rare, so congratulations are in order.......For another generation or two, there will be divided opinions about his importance and impact on society, and, then, he will be forgotten.
He was louche.
I love that word.
good taste
lol
Entirely too much about Hefner. Althouse is just like Playboy; we go there for the photos. Enough said.
".He certainly succeeded in having a pleasant, comfortable life. "
He was a sybarite and that is not very masculine. Dorian Grey, for example.
Louis XIV was royal and, like Philip II, squandered a country that ended up poor.
Elizabeth I was a miser. Read the real history of the Armada.
Drake had to forage for food and gunpowder. Much came from captured Spanish ships.
England ended up rich.
I heard he laid a lot of pipe. Isn't construction masculine?
There is nothing more repulsive to me than that grotto. Would any of you actually dip your body in there?
Exile,
If your friend w/ eight baby moms is rich and a dick slinger, then he is a winner. Resources and cum spreading = winning. Hef checked both boxes.
The Heff testing service drove many new models so he could find the very best one to rate Playmate each month. That sounds like work to me. You could consider Playboy Magazine a Consumer Reports for serially monogamous Puritans .
Hefner had a lot of sex with willing partners for a non-masculine man. By biological standards he was a pretty successful man.
The inner city guys who have 8 kids by 8 different baby mommas agree with PB that "spreading their seed" is the sign of a real man.
Given the basic biological imperatives they are correct. Maximizing your offspring and spreading your genetic inheritance as widely as possible is what it is all about from a animalistic biological standpoint.
Why should we be surprised that the uneducated, uncivilized and irresponsible act in an animalistic manner?
I'm not saying that this behavior is correct or desirable, but don't see it as any more deviant than killing your offspring before birth.
Quaaludes aren't masculine. They are more rapey. I am not sure if rapey is associated on the masculine/feminine scale.
The affectation of the idea of the upper class is also something gay men were doing at the time, which was what started the conversation between me and Meade. We were talking about the documentary “Do I Sound Gay?” Which we watched last night.
As for hanging around with pretty women, that’s slumber party stuff.
Who knows what the actual sex was like? I’ve read some things, but I don’t think it was that macho. Lolling around in bed with women, come on that’s not very masculine in itself. Getting out and working hard, fight for survival, and being daring — that’s masculine. Having sexual intercourse is something that’s easily and lazily done by both men and women, often while very sleepy or drunk. Pajama boys do it just as easily as Marines and professional athletes.
Ha ha..wonder where Meade got that from..
Who knows what the actual sex was like? I’ve read some things, but I don’t think it was that macho. Lolling around in bed with women, come on that’s not very masculine in itself. Getting out and working hard, fight for survival, and being daring — that’s masculine. Having sexual intercourse is something that’s easily and lazily done by both men and women, often while very sleepy or drunk. Pajama boys do it just as easily as Marines and professional athletes.
On behalf of all splooge stooges everywhere...thanks for the womansplaining.
I suppose being lazy, allowing others to provide for you and cowardice are feminine?
Hef is a good counter to the reductionism of the whole Alpha-Beta Male thing. As his female counterpart, the adventuress. is to the simplistic model of female sex drive promulgated by Heartiste. Diana Krall does a great version of that adventuress theme song from the 50s, "Peel Me a Grape."
Norm McDonald has a bit about women being able to take phone calls during sex.
Talk about lolling..
Hugh may have been the original pajama boy, but masculinity is really measured by three things:
1. Physical strength and prowess.
2. Being able to support a family.
3. Getting laid or at least choosing to be monogamous when there are plenty of willing partners.
Hugh, by all accounts, slept with a lot of women, many of them among the most beautiful women in the world. He also was rich which meant he could support a family and did so when it served his fancy. He's not Hercules, but he's certainly a lot more masculine than the current Pajama Boy who is a wimp, is probably living at home, and at ain't bagging any centerfolds any time soon.
Having sex doesn't make you special. People do it all the time! Hefner was just rich enough to get pretty young women to sleep with him when he was old and decrepit. His last wife even fucked him once, briefly. Some people would say a man's desire to get rich is tangled up in the desire to have access to youth when old. I can't imagine getting much pleasure out of an encounter where the woman is holding vomit back, but to each their own.
.......For another generation or two, there will be divided opinions about his importance and impact on society, and, then, he will be forgotten.
10/3/17, 12:35 PM
Yeah. That's about it. I never found him to be a terribly interesting character, and he seemed pathetic and shoddy in his old age. I remember a poem in "Spoon River Analogy" about the town roué who ends up a diseased, toothless, shabby old man still trying to play at being the village Don Juan. Hef had much more fame and money than the character in Edgar Lee Masters' poem but his end was just as pitiful in its' own way.
That grotto was featured in a Sex and the City. The girls walk by to see it filled with large breasted topless women.
"Look at that", says Miranda, "tit soup."
Gotta have a private place to play, right?
Depends on your definition of masculinity, doesn't it? I would think for most men, "getting plenty" pretty much suffices.
Hef was a Beta Male, who made it big.
Myself, I prefer the common man, the guy who works hard, honestly, honorably, to support his family, to save money, to build something in his community. The rest is commentary.
Bob Guccione: compare and contrast.
Real men fight wars and defend the country. Real men invent things, raise families, build and run businesses, write music and literature. They run the world.
Pajama boys only want 3 things: A warm bed, A warm pair of shoes, and a warm pussy.
@buwaya:The model is the Versailles of Louis XIV
Might explain some of the stains and wear-and-tear. Versaille did not have toilets, and it was dangerous to get too far away from wherever the King was, as you might lose influence or be gossiped about or something, so there was a lot of peeing behind columns and in corners.
@Michael K:Louis XIV was royal and, like Philip II, squandered a country that ended up poor.
I've read some of his correspondence with his generals, and what comes through there is that he was incredibly perceptive, tactful, and competent. Now his absolute government did not reward initiative and consequently his generals frequently demanded very specific orders before doing anything. Wars are not run well by remote control, but Louis XIV probably did the best that any human could have done in his situation.
I would imagine the initiative problem extended to economics as well, and if so Louis XIV is therefore to blame--but that is the inherent problem with top-down economics, and I don't imagine anyone could have done better. It simply should not have been done at all. And I don't know how to assign to Louis XIV for the nation and style of governing he was literally born into. I think he made the very most of what he had.
I do envy Hef for his "Grotto". I'd love to have clean, indoor swimming pool with waterfalls and caves.
Hearst had a great indoor and outdoor swimming pool at San Simeon. Much better than Hef's.
BTW, I've read that Kirk Douglas had tunnel built to the Hef Mansion so that he could go there undetected. No sure its true though.
Louis XIV's letter to his son could not make the contrast between himself and Hugh Hefner more clear. It is grossly unfair to the Sun King to put those two men in the same sentence, I think:
There is something more, my son, and I hope that your own experience will never teach it to you: nothing could be more laborious to you than a great amount of idleness if you were to have the misfortune to fall into it through beginning by being disgusted with public affairs, then with pleasure, then with idleness itself, seeking everywhere fruitlessly for what can never be found, that is to say, the sweetness of repose and leisure without having the preceding fatigue and occupation.
I laid a rule on myself to work regularly twice every day, and for two or three hours each time with different persons, without counting the hours which I passed privately and alone, nor the time which I was able to give on particular occasions to any special affairs that might arise. There was no moment when I did not permit people to talk to me about them, provided that they were urgent; with the exception of foreign ministers who sometimes find too favourable moments in the familiarity allowed to them, either to obtain or to discover something, and whom one should not hear without being previously prepared.
I cannot tell you what fruit I gathered immediately I had taken this resolution. I felt myself, as it were, uplifted in thought and courage; I found myself quite another man, and with joy reproached myself for having been too long unaware of it. This first timidity, which a little self-judgment always produces and which at the beginning gave me pain, especially on occasions when I had to speak in public, disappeared in less than no time. The only thing I felt then was that I was King, and born to be one. I experienced next a delicious feeling, hard to express, and which you will not know yourself except by tasting it as I have done. For you must not imagine, my son, that the affairs of State are like some obscure and thorny path of learning which may possibly have already wearied you, wherein the mind strives to raise itself with effort above its purview, more often to arrive at no conclusion, and whose utility or apparent utility is repugnant to us as much as its difficulty. The function of Kings consists principally in allowing good sense to act, which always acts naturally and without effort. What we apply ourselves to is sometimes less difficult than what we do only for our amusement. Its usefulness always follows. A King, however skilful and enlightened be his ministers, cannot put his own hand to the work without its effect being seen. Success, which is agreeable in everything, even in the smallest matters, gratifies us in these as well as in the greatest, and there is no satisfaction to equal that of noting every day some progress in glorious and lofty enterprises, and in the happiness of the people which has been planned and thought out by oneself. All that is most necessary to this work is at the same time agreeable; for, in a word, my son, it is to have one's eyes open to the whole earth; to learn each hour the news concerning every province and every nation, the secrets of every court, the mood and the weaknesses of each Prince and of every foreign minister; to be well-informed on an infinite number of matters about which we are supposed to know nothing; to elicit from our subjects what they hide from us with the greatest care; to discover the most remote opinions of our own courtiers and the most hidden interests of those who come to us with quite contrary professions. I do not know of any other pleasure we would not renounce for that, even if curiosity alone gave us the opportunity.
When I first scrolled past the photo of the grotto I thought it was a picture of a religious grotto...scrolled back up to see the story attached thinking it might be about something gentle and lovely and saw it was the Playboy Grotto...Nope!
Here's a question. If Hef had inherited his $$$ millions and could have gotten plenty of "Playmates" without his magazine, would he have founded Playboy? Or would've he have just lounged around his entire life having sex with his bunnies?
Hefner made straight sex "gay"
(and FWIW, some bunny has claimed Hef watches gay porn while having sex with bunnies)
https://calvinistinternational.com/2017/10/02/hugh-hefner-porn-and-the-homosexualization-of-sex/
Manly: cajun navy.
I think the word I would use for Hef is successful but effete. Successful is necessary for men but is not equivalent to manliness.
I remember a poem in "Spoon River Analogy" about the town roué who ends up a diseased, toothless, shabby old man still trying to play at being the village Don Juan.
Pls remind me which name/grave
“but masculinity is really measured by three things:
1. Physical strength and prowess.
2. Being able to support a family.
3. Getting laid or at least choosing to be monogamous when there are plenty of willing partners.”
Well, if #3 refers to the ability to do it, women are way more masculine than men. Women are so macho by the #3 standard that we have to take strong measures — like a professional boxer re street fights — to avoid nearly all of the opportunities.
“I suppose being lazy, allowing others to provide for you and cowardice are feminine?”
Your logic is terrible.
Some think logic is masculine.
I thought Hef worked pretty hard himself most of the time.
A magazine does not publish itself, nor did the rest of his many other businesses (at the time) run themselves either.
He retired, in effect, several decades ago, but before then I think he put in his time doing actual work.
My analogy was Hefners establishment vs Versailles, not necessarily Louis XIV himself vs Hefner. Louis XIV seems to have been a one-woman-at-a-time man, at least, staying with a particular mistress for a considerable period. Versailles as a place to see and be seen, and to obtain opportunity and favors was more like the Hefner mansion in function. People came to kowtow to Hefner.
Louis XV however was more Hefner-like. The parc aux cerfs and all that.
The other analogy was Tiberius on Capri - and in that case Hefner comes of as much less perverted.
Who among us would not readily swap the life of Hugh Hefner for that of Mother Theresa. While it's true that she didn't get lucky very often, she did manage to achieve a moral grandeur. In the long run, what gives your life savor and significance is not how many Playboy models, you sleep with but rather how many lepers whose feet you have washed.
"Women are so macho by the #3 standard that we have to take strong measures — like a professional boxer re street fights — to avoid nearly all of the opportunities."
LOL. Going by how many men you've laid, a street Hooker is the most macho person in the world. Or perhaps Andrew Sullivan is the most macho man alive, I'm sure he's gone "bare back" riding with more partners, then 99% of straight men.
It must be a cultural thing, but where I grew up, Grown up Men - not HS and College students - weren't measured by how many bimbo's they could talk into bed. In fact, a man who spends his whole life bedding women was called a "Gigolo". It seems some people think that's a compliment.
Bad Lieutenant:
Lucius Atherton
WHEN my moustache curled,
And my hair was black,
And I wore tight trousers
And a diamond stud,
I was an excellent knave of hearts and took many a trick.
But when the gray hairs began to appear--
Lo! a new generation of girls
Laughed at me, not fearing me,
And I had no more exciting adventures
Wherein I was all but shot for a heartless devil,
But only drabby affairs, warmed-over affairs
Of other days and other men.
And time went on until I lived at
Mayer's restaurant,
Partaking of short-orders, a gray, untidy,
Toothless, discarded, rural Don Juan. . . .
There is a mighty shade here who sings
Of one named Beatrice;
And I see now that the force that made him great
Drove me to the dregs of life.
@rcocean:In fact, a man who spends his whole life bedding women was called a "Gigolo"
I thought gigolos were kept men.
Hef is a beta male ... I had never seen it before. Maybe that’s why he repulsed me. I’m a bit beta myself by nature but I’ve overcome it. I put down the guitar and grab a chainsaw. Does it every time.
A young black man named Jonathan Smith worked to save people in Las Vegas until he was shot himself.
A retired Marine stole a truck and drove it to the concert grounds and took wounded and dying people to the hospital
Another Marine saved the life of a girl he had just met an hour earlier.
Those are manly men.
You CAN do it all - conquering both nations and their women -
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2010/08/1-in-200-men-direct-descendants-of-genghis-khan/
@Ann: “Some think logic is masculine.“
It is masculine. Just ask James Damore. Or walk through the programmers section of the company.
"I thought gigolos were kept men."
You're right. If they're not kept, they're usually called Pimps.
Ann Althouse said...
Some think logic is masculine.
That's funny.
Blogger buwaya said...I thought Hef worked pretty hard himself most of the time. A magazine does not publish itself, nor did the rest of his many other businesses (at the time) run themselves either.
--
Yeah..but no chainsaw, carburetors or boxin'..so say the academics.
M. Jordan, perhaps that is why Dylan puts down his guitar and picks up the arc welder
Connecting the dots on the Hugh Hefner posts, is Althouse intimating that Donald Trump modeled his life in the image of the original pajama boy?
Blogger rcocean said...
"Pajama boys only want 3 things: A warm bed, A warm pair of shoes, and a warm pussy."
Is that anything like "loose shoes, tight pussy and a warm place to shit"?
@exiledonmainstreet:
Once, when midnight smote the air,
Eunuchs ran through Hell and met
From thoroughfare to thoroughfare,
While that great Juan galloped by;
And like these to rail and sweat 5
Staring upon his sinewy thigh.
I wonder if there are any eccentric rich guys who live in grottoes.
Ann Althouse said...
“I suppose being lazy, allowing others to provide for you and cowardice are feminine?”
Your logic is terrible.
Some think logic is masculine.
10/3/17, 3:58 PM
Is that why you don't favor logic, because it doesn't become you?
Logic is men in shorts. Who's with me boys?
Some say Anthony Bourdain, at 61, no pajamas, is quite masculine.
Ah, but Gabriel, "that great Juan" ended up in hell.
Meade, since Bourdain has said he'd like to poison the President, I find him much less appealing.
And poisoning strikes me as a distinctly sneaky, unmanly method of murdering someone, although I can see why a chef would favor it. I think of Lucrezia Borgia. Be a man, Anthony, and challenge Trump to a duel at 20 paces!
"Is that anything like "loose shoes, tight pussy and a warm place to shit"?"
To you maybe. Not to me. Different strokes, etc.
"Some say Anthony Bourdain, at 61, no pajamas, is quite masculine."
No doubt. But others say that he- like most men over 55 - should keep their shirts on. Otherwise they look like skeletons with six pack abs.
Your logic is terrible.
At least I use it.
You stated that: "Getting out and working hard, fight for survival, and being daring — that’s masculine."
If those attributes represent masculinity to you, why is it illogical to ask "“I suppose being lazy, allowing others to provide for you and cowardice are feminine?”
Some think logic is masculine.
I don't. I'm just disappointed women don't use it more often.
At least I know that it has nothing to do with emotion.
Personally I think many women work hard, fight for survival and are daring..which is why I don't label those traits as masculine.
Many men are lazy, allow others to support them and are cowardly. which is why I don't consider those traits feminine.
Since you were being sexist, I asked you if you did.
All of this debate over 'what is masculinity' leads me to believe that someday we'll be debating over which bathroom to use.
I appreciated the guy's savvy "empire" building and actually did read the articles, but I always thought him a little pathetic in his pajamas with a bevy of beauties on his arm, more and more so as he got older. The pajama parties at the mansion cracked me up. But they were a coveted invitation among the Hollywood crowd and turned men's designer PJs into a cottage industry.
Lawnboy is making love to the grass.
I can't imagine the body fluids that have gone down in that water. Groooooooooss.
Everything that you swim in touches your body fluids. Groooooossss.
Lolling around in bed with women, come on that’s not very masculine in itself.
For a man it is.
@exiledonmainstreet:Ah, but Gabriel, "that great Juan" ended up in hell.
So did the eunuchs. May as well hang for a sheep...
There are great sinners and little sinners. Though I don't think Hef was the great type. There was little risk to him in what he did.
Getting out and working hard, fight for survival, and being daring — that’s masculine.
And very life-shortening.
Having sexual intercourse is something that’s easily and lazily done by both men and women, often while very sleepy or drunk.
Sounds like you're doing it wrong. Men have to work for it, BTW.
They're not doing it to work. They're doing it to have sex. Sorry if you thought they must have something more "noble" in mind when directing their attention at you.
Meade, since Bourdain has said he'd like to poison the President, I find him much less appealing.
So go have sex with the president, then, FFS. Who cares! The two of you can eat well-done steaks and greasy fast food fries and hamburgers and two scoops of ice cream together until your taste buds rot and your adipose cells burst open!
That grotto was featured in a Sex and the City. The girls walk by to see it filled with large breasted topless women.
"Look at that", says Miranda, "tit soup."
Which we now know, she was more than happy to imbibe.
You won't find Trump hanging out in a grotto.
Everything that you swim in touches your body fluids. Groooooossss.
I won't presume to speak to your social or recreational choices, but no one fucks strangers for money in the bodies of water I swim in.
The Toothless Revolutionary said...
Meade, since Bourdain has said he'd like to poison the President, I find him much less appealing.
So go have sex with the president, then, FFS"
So according to Ritmo logic, if you don't like that Bourdain said he wants to murder the president that means you want to have sex with Trump. That doesn't make sense, even as a joke.
You're getting shriller and more ridiculous every day, Ritmo.
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