Do not adjust your computer screen. No need to get your glasses fixed.
The news is nearly unthinkable – but it is true.
Playboy is covering up.
For 62 years, the iconic adult magazine has fueled sexual fantasies with glossy fold-out spreads of fully nude women. Furtively hidden in adolescent bedrooms and defiantly plastered on college dorm room walls, it helped spark America’s sexual revolution and tested the country’s acceptance of photos that in an earlier day passed for pornography.
But in the age easily available digital pornography Playboy has decided to put clothes on its centerfolds.
Starting in March, Playboy will no longer feature full nudity. The change – which might seem minor to those unfamiliar with the magazine but is the adult entertainment equivalent of Bob Dylan going electric – is part of a broader redesign of the publication, Playboy said in a statement.
Playboy called it a “a top-to-bottom redesign,” a “reimagined Playboy magazine will include a completely modern editorial and design approach, and, for the first time in its history, will no longer feature nudity in its pages.” It promised to “continue to publish sexy, seductive pictorials of the world’s most beautiful women, including its iconic Playmates, all shot by some of today’s most renowned photographers.”
In an interview with the New York Times, which broke the story, Playboy executives admitted the magazine had fallen prey to the very animal founder Hugh Hefner helped unleash more than half a century ago: America’s demand for porn, now in the digital age.
“That battle has been fought and won,” Playboy chief executive Scott Flanders told the Times. “You’re now one click away from every sex act imaginable for free. And so it’s just passé at this juncture.”
To the relief of Playboy fans, and the regret of its critics, however, the magazine will still feature plenty of perfectly airbrushed models in suggestive poses. But now they will be scantily clad, rather than completely naked.
Playboy has described the shift as pragmatic, and part of a broader effort to bring the company into the 21st century.
The company cleaned up its website last year and saw traffic quadruple and the median age of its readers move from 47 years of age to 30, “an attractive demographic for advertisers,” its statement noted.
Now Playboy aims to do the same with its magazine, which can still be found inside plastic wrappers on the back shelf at the local supermarket.
The new Playboy magazine will still feature a Playmate of the Month, but the photos now will be PG-13, Chief Content Officer Cory Jones told the Times. The pictures will also be less produced, reflecting the more informal style popularized by social media. “A little more accessible,” he told the newspaper, “a little more intimate.”
