Hef

Broadsheet is soliciting opinions on Playboy chairwoman and CEO (and daughter of Hugh) Christie Hefner:

The Australian today has a piece about 53-year-old Playboy chairwoman and CEO Christie Hefner's recent trip to Melbourne.

Hefner is such a fascinating figure: Her fortune is built on the bodies of women scantily dressed in cottontails, yes. But she's also a committed pro-choice, left-wing activist and a great believer in and supporter of women in business.

"Forty per cent of my executive staff is female," she told the Australian, "including the chief financial officer and the heads of marketing, administrative services and human resources." She also credited the company's growth to her ability to "attract so many bright successful women."

What are Broadsheet readers' thoughts on the woman who holds the keys to the mansion these days?

I met Christie Hefner many years ago at, of all places, a high school journalism conference. She was a fantastic and interesting speaker, and a very warm, generous person, too, who left me inspired on many counts. I think she’s eminently diggable.

Built into the question, however, is, of course, a request to comment on the possible incompatibility of being a feminist and a porn advocate, and I guess it depends on what one’s feelings about porn are. I don’t have a problem with porn—at least not the kinds found in the pages of Playboy. Child porn and porn dependent on exploitative images of mistreating or belittling women (or men) bother me. Pictures of happy naked people don’t.

And while I’m aware that behind any pornographic image is the possibility of a person who is unhappy or has been exploited, I don’t find that any more reason to categorically condemn pornography than any other profession in which workers can be mistreated and taken advantage of. White-, blue-, and pink-collared women can be—and are—sexually exploited, too. Which is, in part, why I’m a feminist…to make sure that each person, irrespective of gender or career, is treated with equality, dignity, and respect. Another part of it is legitimizing a variety of choices for women, including being a porn star.

(There’s a whole issue of objectification that I’m not really going into, but suffice it to say, at the moment, that my attitude about objectification is not a porn- or even body-specific issue, and that there are more insidious sociological factors that promulgate objectification than nudity and/or pornography.)