There are plenty of other adult magazines, but they are just pictorials full of explicit sex-with, "Hustler," being the most well-known. It maybe wasn't better than, "Playboy," but it's still here, so I guess it wins by default when compared to its closest competitor in terms of content. "Penthouse," just always kind of existed and if it was known for anything it was perhaps the supposedly real letters they received full of outrageously impossible sexual encounters, Still, somehow in 2022 it still exists. "Penthouse," lacked the insightful journalism, short stories, comics, and so forth of, "Playboy." It didn't have the lowbrow rabble-rouser vibe of mischief that Larry Flynt brought with, "Hustler," along with some really edgy content. To answer my question of if, "Penthouse," is any good still, I have to ask if it was ever that great?Īrguably what, "Penthouse," is most known for. If you caught your teenage son or daughter reading this in their bedroom you wouldn't be shocked so much as you'd look at them quizzically and say, "You do realize stuff 100X raunchier than this can be found with a quick search on your phone, right?" I mean, unlike with the departed, "Playboy," you aren't reading this for the articles. The articles are fine but not fantastic like the literature, "Playboy," put out and the images are, well, half-naked to mostly-naked women posing. There are some little mini-articles with news tidbits, a feature on that Canadian trucker shitshow that happened, an article about billionaire Mark Cuban, and a number of softcore pictorials. It arrived in the mail and I opened it up. I picked up the May/June 2022 issue on eBay ( eBay banned most adult material a while ago but allows tame magazines) as I didn't immediately see it at my local Barnes and Noble. This leads to the question of if, "Penthouse," is any good, still? As for how raunchy it could be, I checked Wikipedia and from 1998 to 2005 it could be pretty, "Hardcore," but then softened itself back up and became a bit tamer like, "Playboy," again. "Penthouse," never was really known for its articles. I honestly would sometimes read the magazine for its great writing, as nerdy as that sounds ( I was eventually able to get one of the later issues that featured a Simon Hansenlmann comic I was after when I posted about the struggle that turned out to be). It is no secret that, "Playboy," had some amazing articles, comics, and short fiction. Maybe the website with more explicit content helps pay for the magazine potentially operating at a loss. Perhaps it gets enough advertisers that the magazine can be released and offer cheap subscriptions. Back in 2016 it was rumored it would cease releasing a print magazine, but that was denied by the company and here it still is, against all odds. Hence, when I wondered about the fate of, "Penthouse," I was utterly shocked it still is putting out issues every other month or so. Harvey was surprised to learn it after the fact. I didn't realize, "Playboy," stopped much how R.C. "Penthouse," must surely be dead or not putting out anything especially, "New," beyond best-of pictorial compilations, right? Nope, much to my surprise when I Googled it, "Penthouse," releases new issues. "Hustler," still puts out some magazines (like the niche-style, "Taboo," and, "Barely Legal,") that are pretty much just pictorials of hardcover pornography with DVDs sometimes included because I guess it helps promote their internet sites although the company itself admits that soon its print iterations will be kaput. It had competitors in the form of the much more raunchy and edgy, "Hustler," and the somewhat tamer, "Penthouse." What happened to them, though? It wasn't just Playboy that existed, however. Harvey did a retrospective on, "Playboy," and Hugh Hefner himself that wasn't overly critical or fawning of the complex legacy the man and magazine left behind for better or worse. I mean, there is an online archive of articles and pictorials people can subscribe to so they can look back on the glory days, but for all intents and purposes, "Playboy," is a shadow of what it once was. It released its last issue with little fanfare and now exists more as a brand of the bunny rabbit logo on merchandise than anything else. Playboy magazine quietly stopped existing as a printed publication in the Spring of 2020. I continue to be fascinated by how the media impacts our lives and sexuality, so I created this big article. I simply have a Master's Degree in Public Health and worked in various positions including one focused on sexual health before I left the workforce to be a stay-at-home parent. Before we embark on this big essay I want to clarify I am not a doctor or professional anthropologist/sociologist.
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