The Case Against the Sexual Revolution. Louise Perry
would-be Hugh Hefners are also hurt by the pretence, albeit in a less obvious way. Mouldering away in the Playboy mansion doesn’t kill a person, but it does corrode them. True happiness is not to be found on a soiled mattress being ridden by a woman who doesn’t even like you.
Liberal ideology flatters us by telling us that our desires are good and that we can find meaning in satisfying them, whatever the cost. But the lie of this flattery should be obvious to anyone who has ever realised after the fact that they were wrong to desire something, and hurt themselves, or hurt other people, in pursuing it. So I am going to propose an alternative form of sexual culture – one that recognises other human beings as real people, invested with real value and dignity. It’s time for a sexual counter-revolution.
Notes
1 1. Gianluca Mezzofiore, ‘No, that viral picture doesn’t show Hugh Hefner lighting a cigarette for Marilyn Monroe’, 28 September 2017, https://mashable.com/2017/09/28/marilyn-monroe-hugh-hefner-fake-picture-playboy/?europe=true.
2 2. Jack Shepherd, ‘Hugh Hefner dead: Playboy founder is being buried next to Marilyn Monroe’, 28 September 2017, www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news.
3 3. Jeff Gottlieb, ‘For sale: eternity with Marilyn Monroe’, 14 August 2009, www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2009-aug-14-me-marilyn14-story.html.
4 4. Brad Witter, ‘Marilyn Monroe didn’t actually pose for the first issue of Playboy’, 8 September 2020, www.biography.com/news/marilyn-monroe-playboy-first-issue-didnt-pose.
5 5. Scott Johnson, 4 October 2017, www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/playboys-first-black-playmate-reflects-hugh-hefners-legacy-1045838.
6 6. Witter, ‘Marilyn Monroe didn’t actually pose’.
7 7. ‘Hugh Hefner will be buried next to Marilyn Monroe’, 29 September 2017, www.telegraph.co.uk/films/2017/09/29/hugh-hefner-buried-next-marilyn-monroe-fans-not-happy/.
8 8. Megan C. Hills, ‘How Hugh Hefner built an entire empire without Marilyn Monroe’s consent’, 29 September 2017, www.marieclaire.co.uk/news/celebrity-news/hugh-hefner-marilyn-monroe-541688.
9 9. Andrea Dworkin, Right-Wing Women. New York: Perigee Books, [1978] 1983, p. 18.
10 10. Corita Grudzen, Daniella Meeker, Jacqueline Torres et al., ‘Comparison of the mental health of female adult film performers and other young women in California’, Psychiatric Services 62 (2011): 639–45.
11 11. Sam Kashner, ‘Marilyn and her monsters’, 5 October 2010, www.vanityfair.com/culture/2010/11/marilyn-monroe-201011.
12 12. ‘Hugh Hefner quotes’, 28 September 2017, https://heavy.com/entertainment/2017/09/hugh-hefner-quotes-on-life-death-playboy-is-alive-dead/.
13 13. Olivia Bahou, 11 June 2015, www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/news/a41845/worst-things-playmates-said-about-playboy-mansion/.
14 14. Ibid.
15 15. Sharon Waxman, 28 September 2017, www.thewrap.com/hugh-hefner-legacy-no-feminist-hero/.
16 16. Graeme Culliford, ‘Sickening pimp secret’, 2 October 2017, www.thesun.co.uk/news/4585472/brit-model-lured-girls-to-the-playboy-mansion-to-have-orgies-with-hugh-hefner/.
17 17. Brooks Barnes, ‘The loin in winter’, 23 October 2009, www.nytimes.com/2009/10/24/business/media/24hefner.html?pagewanted=2&sq=hefner&st=cse&scp=1.
18 18. Emma Gray, ‘The contradictory feminist legacy of Playboy’s Hugh Hefner’, 29 September 2017, www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/playboy-hugh-hefner-feminist-contradiction_n_59cd07c4e4b0210dfdfc822d?ri18n=true.
19 19. Nalina Eggert, ‘Hugh Hefner death: was the Playboy revolution good for women?’, 28 September 2017, www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41426299.
20 20. Pascale Day, ‘Opinion’, 28 September 2017, https://metro.co.uk/2017/09/28/hugh-hefner-might-have-been-a-sleaze-but-playboy-helped-push-feminism-forwards-6963213/?ito=cbshare.
21 21. Patrick J. Deneen, June 2015, www.firstthings.com/article/2015/06/the-power-elite.
22 22. See www.theguardian.com/film/2017/mar/05/emma-watson-vanity-fair-cover-feminism.
23 23. Thanks to the American writer Aaron Sibarium for coining the term ‘sexual disenchantment’ here: see https://americancompass.org/the-commons/three-theses-about-cuties/.
24 24. https://medium.com/@totalsratmove?p=2194a96bdbb6.
25 25. Jessica Valenti, ‘#MeToo is about more than stopping rape’, 31 January 2018, www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/31/me-too-we-demand-more-jessica-valenti.
26 26. Jessica Valenti and Jaclyn Friedman, Believe Me: How Trusting Women Can Change the World. New York: Basic Books.
27 27. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_universities_with_BDSM_clubs.
28 28. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_Week_at_Yale.
29 29. Allie Grasgreen, ‘Fifty shades of crimson’, 5 December 2012, www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/12/05/kink-clubs-harvards-well-established-healthy-students.
30 30. C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy. London: HarperCollins, 2012.
31 31. See www.glamour.com/story/12-friends-moments-that-will-totally-make-you-cringe-now.
32 32. Laura House, ‘Plan dinner the night before, NEVER complain and speak in a soft voice’,