The media aided and abetted Hugh Hefner which led to the #MeToo moments that traumatized women.
As actors say, "Write anything good or bad as long as you write about me."
Why is the NY Times giving any publicity at all to this degrading of women turning them into "sex toys" or "sex objects"?
Please cease and desist and help prevent this horrid nightmare from happening all over again.
And please convey this message of media blackout on this kind of "business."
4
One thing I'm almost certain of, these women will not be getting paid the equivalent of 600 dollars for a lunch shift, adjusted for inflation. If they are, I shudder to think of what a martini will cost.
3
Women have been judging other women (in the very worst sense of the word...) since before the first Playboy Club was ever thought up.
4
so bizarre,#metoo juxtaposed against this. As a woman feminist I feel sorry for men getting wierd mixed signals. Women: be as sexy as you want in your life—but serving men (food, drink) with empasis on serving sends a very different message...ugh.
9
As Gloria Steinem said, Playboy Bunnies are a gendered minstrel show. When will we all stop resorting to exaggerated stereotypes for entertainment?
9
@Peter
When we no longer have sex.
8
The bunnies said they made 600 dollars a shift, felt safe, and were able to put away enough money to save for the next chapter of their lives. I'm imagining the typical job open to women back then paid less than 600 bucks a month. If you think I'm exaggerating, the minimum wage was $1.25 in 1964, jumping to a whopping $1.60 by 1969.
If you know of a similar job where I can be exploited in such a manner, please let me know ASAP.
6
Years ago, a girlfriend of my sister applied to be a Bunny --or maybe "auditioned" is a better word. She failed the Rear End Test. You leaned against the wall and shifted your weight on your legs, while being judged from behind on the action of your hams.
I know many --maybe most-- women have tough choices in the employment world, but I wonder if it's not essentially more honest to be a sex worker than a sex waitress. The former's clients pay for sex, the latter's pay for superiority.
7
What is wrong with these women?
5
@Samantha Kelly Nothing. They're better looking than most, they'll make good money and they could make some important connections to help them in their careers. As a feminist, I try not to judge other women's choices. Isn't that an important tenet of feminism?
10
I hope they have some stunning trans hostesses for their new venue.
3
I stayed at The Out many times. I don't know what "gay-themed" meant exactly, other than a hotel where gays could safely stay. It attracted a lot of families as well. I have stayed there in its new incarnation also, but nobody said anything about the club. So a "gay-themed" hotel is lost, and the Playboy Club is gained. That's progress, I guess.
3
Best line in the article: "a gendered minstrel show." It wouldn't surprise me if it was safer and better paid than being a diner waitress. The actors in the best-known of the minstrel shows were paid well, too. The minstrel shows were still a reflection and reenforcement of a racist society. I don't blame the young women who take the jobs -- but this is absolutely a reflection and reenforcement of a sexist society.
13
As broke college students my roommate saw an ad in the local paper that the local Playboy Club was hiring Bunnies. They said we could make close to $500 a week, part-time. A small fortune for us back in 1983. So we went. There was no amount of padding that would help my flat chest but they did hire my roommate. She was able to pay for college and then some. We were both die hard feminists and saw this as a legitimate way to exploit men or should I say their wallets. My roommate did say there were some creeps but all she had to say is 'Senator So-n-So' I am sure your wife would not approve. If that didn't take care of it the management quickly did.
I love the comments on the costumes. If the bunny suit is bad, then so are the things trendy pop singer wear and the super hero costumes. And yes, these all of costumes are to promote sexual stimulation. If skimpy costumes were superior battle attire, the US military would have everyone in Wonder Woman and He-Man uniforms.
12
Playboy Club? It's time has come and gone. This is like trying to put the tooth paste back in the bottle. There was a time when people would walk past a movie theater during the summer heat and there was a sign that read "Come in it's Kool inside.
A good idea for it's day.That's about where this Idea is Now.
5
The "Me NOT" movement? As long as women agree to be seen as bodies for the gaping, patriarchy will gladly comply. It always feels sad to me to see women participating in this way. The fake empowerment line that they have some form of control is just tragic. The men surrounding them in this environment are emotional rapists at best.
6
I confess - I read (past tense) Playboy for both the articles and the women. Every enterprise has made mistakes along the line, but let's remember some of Playboy's insightful interviews including newsmaking ones, like with President Jimmy Carter. Let's remember The Playboy Philosophy, which, until it went on far too long, was a thoughtful statement in a repressive era of moderate-to-liberal views. Let's remember the many artists and writers whose careers were bolstered by Playboy, including Leroy Neiman and Ian Fleming. So they want to have a club again? Why not?!? Good for them - and good for the women who will have jobs in which they may well grow, as did Lauren Hutton and the other ex-Bunnies who have formed a "sorority" of mutual support and friendship that has lasted decades. And good, too, for those people who want to stay away. At last report, this is still a country where we have freedom of choice to or not to participate. Let those who wish to partake do so without interference or judgment.
7
I think this is an idea that has come and gone, and an attempt to revive it even with the beautiful décor, will fail. Other attempts to revive these clubs failed, why should this be any different?
8
@DS Because NYC gets huge numbers of conventioneers intown without their wives tagging along..?
2
I only went to a Playboy Club once...it was whichever venue was close to Carnegie Hall in 1976/77....I was 11 or 12....my Dad took me in. Solti was supposed to conduct at Carnegie Hall that evening - and the performance was delayed because he had slipped in the bathtub -- so my father had his daughter and some time to kill and I guess wasn't quite sure of the best solution.
It struck my tween eyes as an odd experience but safe...and I don't recall anyone blinking an eye as I walked through the bar.
I didn't really think about it much until I was older. But then I realized why he picked the Playboy Club. The club had an attached movie theater that was screening Mel Brooks' "The Last Remake of Beau Geste." My dad thought a movie was a good place to hang out while we waited for the concert....and I guess he figured it was a classy movie theater because it was affiliated with the Playboy Club....Or it was just close by and it was a movie he wanted to see.
6
Best line in the article: “Hard to imagine any New Yorker going except Donald Trump.”
30
In other words, this is a more affluent, sophisticated version of Hooters?
36
I really don’t care, do U ??? Seriously, as a long time, card carrying feminist, more power to young Women that CHOOSE this. Probably safer than working in a regular restaurant and MUCH more lucrative. Please, save your MONEY. Gravity is NOT your friend. Speaking from experience. Seriously.
41
I might stop by just to read the articles...
46
Sorry folks but there is a reason a man has a car and a woman has a garage. Hail the Bunny's
7
@MelGlass :is it because street parking requires a permit?
14
Cooper Hefner, put your money where your mouth is: if you want a pan-sexual brand (which is the smart move for the future) then give us pan-sexual bunnies!
If Hefner, Jr., is serious about creating a "pan sexual" brand, it would be brilliant, and he would truly be taking his father's legacy forward into the future. He can start by having a separate "Pan-Room" at the Club, if he wants to test it out.
That would truly be new and it would be a hit (anyone remember the great trans nights at the Pyramid Club?).
This "all female bunnies concept" is not going to be enough...we already have Hooters and myriad upscale strip joints and some expensive private clubs for that.
6
@Lily
I would consider going if I could see hot young male bunnies.
2
Is somebody putting a gun to their heads and forcing them to do this? A waitress in a dinner is under more danger. That said, I give this new edition about six months.
11
I'll leave the debate to others... Shawn, a well-written and reported piece of work!
9
As Victoria’s Secret Angels were mentioned, let me just say I'm disappointed with the women I see there now, post-Klum and Banks, with their new management.
In those times, they were skinny but at least had something "up there" in the chest, and Klum and Banks are kinda fun and funny, even zany. Now the ones I've seen combine the worst emaciatedness of skinny models with the worst blahness of people who aren't quite models, all without any of the "revolutionary" goodness of "plus-size" (i.e. non-starved) or other types underrepresented in fashion. I see less "there", there.
Far from abhorring Playboy, I was sad when the pirate equity firm talked Hefner's magazine into nixing the nudity. It seems to be back, though in a needlessly, annoyingly coy way. We're all adults (well...those of us over 18 and not "covfefe") here. We can choose to buy the mag or not—be yourselves.
As for the Club? Not like I've gone or will go to one, but I hope they (employer and customers) treat the women with some semblance of respect this time. They can start with a living wage—like Hutton's big lunch shift haul, instead of the minimum for tipped jobs Because They Can.
Maybe others in print *cough*the Times*cough* can learn from Playboy's strategy. Sell more swag and logo'd stuff to keep the paper alive with less (or far better yet, NO) ads! "Your purchase supports non-crazy journalism", yadayada.
4
Sure it's exploitative, but when scantly clad young women can cause middle-aged men to spend ridiculous amounts of money just to look, I'm not sure that it's the women that are being exploited.
The bottom line is that (if done right) it's just entertainment. And these women are learning people-handling skills (manipulation) that they are unlikely to learn elsewhere.
37
This is why I love NY. Out of a gay-themed hotel, a Playboy Club, and a Ted Cruz event, it's the Ted Cruz event that "incited local ire."
29
Given the terrible wages and working conditions of most of the newly created jobs that Trump and his supporters are boasting about, it is not difficult to understand why working in this creepy establishment could seem like a step up.
15
As long as there are men, there will be places like this. It says more about them, AND the women who work there, than anything else. Upscale Hooters. Que Sera, sera.
19
This is ridiculously retro, something Trump will admire and join. It's Mad Men misogyny. Are there not equally lucrative but more progressive ways to capitalize on the Playboy name?
9
By all means, this seems like the perfect time for men to weigh in. Oh wait.
Yo, NYT, you don't need to dig all the way down to Gloria Steinem to get the counter view on this thing. You also might think twice about hiring a man to write this piece.
Meanwhile, this is a significant amount of free press. To that, hat's off to the Bunny Club.
14
I still have my gold metal Playboy Club card.
Can I go?
9
Oh please. If there is one thing the #MeToo should have taught us, it's that you don't have to work in your birthday suit to get assaulted or harassed.
I worked as a stripper for a near-decade and loved how overt the boundaries and protections were. Many women I worked with described what I had experienced, widespread harassment/assault at work and sadly at home/personal life/ walking down the streets.
22
@Maria Pardon me, I don't quite follow your meaning. The women in Playboy are protected. Do you say that you were protected even though you were in your birthday suit? So it was outside these protected environments where harassment occurred, not on the job? If so I think that is what the argument that Gloria Steinem presents. There are controls in the environment, made by men, for the benefit of men, to serve men. Just like hiring a smart young female college graduate to serve tea and do errands for her boss, as a matter of the the unwritten rules of the job. I doubt the value of on the job experience, unless you count contacts to use for another job. Secondly, I am thinking this is a story about women who were lucky enough to be born with physical, character riches. They are a kind of privileged elite. They were chosen from how many competitors? Like getting into an Ivy League school? Whereas you had the same physical qualifications, why couldn't you get the same level of job, if you didn't mind the uniform? I am not rying to hurt your feelings or your argument. I basically agree with Ms. Steinem, from a father of two daughters point of view.
3
@KomaGawa
As “a father of two daughters”, Hopefully you can stop referring to women’s bodies as either with or without “physical character riches”.
I suggest you update/expand your feminist literature as well if you find this subject compelling/important.
If you’ve been paying attention to any of the recent news, the world is currently reckoning with historic and ongoing denial of women’s workplace safety and refusal to provide recourse for reported misconduct- sexual assault and harassment.
Oh and stripping doesn’t just benefit men- sorry if that bothers you, -a mother of three and public interest attorney
1
Imagination rules the world and ideas like this debase the idea of what it means to be a woman. We need artists to create for us a modern Antigone, a Nora from Ibsen's play, or any of George Eliot's characters, to inspire the identity of a modern, beautiful, free, and courageous generation of women. Women are more robust emotionally than men, have more imagination generally, and they certainly have more compassion, while also being able to get out of predicaments better. Us men are abject creatures when compared to women. I'm not sexist, but that's what it seems like from here.
13
Just what Midtown needs - another tourist trap.
12
Yeah, whatever. If that's what young women want to do with their time, fine.
I consider myself a feminist and strong supporter of the #MeToo movement, but this doesn't bother me in the least.
BIg yawn.
31
Meh. It's a fantasy/play space for straight guys. It's not my cup of tea, as a gay man, but it's not offensive. In the grans scheme of things this is pretty tame. (Google "Puppy Play" and "Furries" for some of the more exotic, but also harmless diversions people have)
I have too much respect for the intelligence of women to think they don't know what is going on when they choose to work there. Some of them will like the attention while remaining untouchable (at least while on the clock)
My only objection is when clueless straight guys think their "thing" is everybody's "thing" and start deciding it's a good idea to have business meetings in spaces like this. That would take us back to the dark ages.
28
@Nobody This is an excellent point about heteronormativity.
But imaging people's grandmas asking them what a fursona is today is hysterical. I guess everyone has to learn not to Google if you aren't prepared for results you can't unsee.
1
If you like it, go; if not, don’t. Either way, it really doesn’t matter.
9
The entire women's movement is hurt by these establishments and by the women that work there. They are in essence saying it is OK to sexualize and to objectify women. Dressing up as a bunny to serve men...really? In 2018?
14
@David
No, the entire women's movement is being hurt by men obsessively telling women what to where, how to act, where to go and how to protect themselves.
In 2018 you should understand, that advice has been proven wrong six ways to Sunday.
Women in bunny suits tend to know their boundaries and have support staff to enforce them. Not so true in journalism, the literary world, actors guild, academia, domestic labor, and the list goes on.
18
@David Feminism isn't defined by what men think or want women to do. That's kind of the opposite of feminism. Women are free to dress in any legal way without your permission or mine. Women are free to be sexy, sexual, or not as the mood strikes. When men respect women as full fledged people who have complete say over their own bodies--this sort of thing would't cause any pearl clutching. Weirdly--a situation like this in which women can dress provocatively and earn good money and are safe--because patrons and co-workers understand and respect their bodily autonomy--is exactly the way women should be treated outside a place like this club. And women are not treated that way because of what happens outside these clubs. I think this place is silly, but I don't have to go to it or work there. I wouldn't tell women they should or shouldn't, because I respect their right to decide themselves.
Here's what men can do, if they want to be a good allies. Learn the difference between admiration and objectifying and teach it to others. A woman who dresses up may do it for herself and/or to be admired. She's not asking people to assume her body is theirs for the taking. It's the difference between going to a museum to look at the exhibit and going to the museum to case the joint. You might wonder what it'd be like to have the painting at home, but you understand and respect that it's not yours. You can look, but you would't even think of touching it without express permission.
7
You really believe this does no harm? What about the young girls who see the club? What about the boys that ask about it and what goes on there?
2
Glad to see this happening; I personally would want to be a member, but I’m sure once the dust settles, the membership fee, would, like everything else in New York, be so exhorbinant, that I’d end up feeling cheated at every turn...
1
I think the bunny costume reveals something primitive and perhaps built-in to male preference, the desire to dominate and debase women as a central feature of sexual relations. If you imagine the reverse, say men dressed up in kitten or puppy costumes, with puppy ears on, it would be ludicrous. It would be interesting if we asked more questions about why this is, that men want to see women packaged in a very cute, but completely humiliating way, and women happily oblige.
14
@Fritz, Poverty is often a strong incentive.
6
@Fritz
Of course it's something primitive. It's called reproduction, evolution, and our DNA. It's a genie that has not bottle, despite the best efforts of many people to pretend that there is one.
Uh, this is gross. Young women volunteering to do this are so naive. Well, when a woman is immature and insecure she is vulnerable to the allure of money and the power of her sexuality. I guess they have to learn the hard way....
I hope mature men and women boycott this place and it goes into bankruptcy...
33
The continuing infantilisation of adult women is troubling.
25
@sfdphd:
How judgmental of you! Maybe you can tell women what else they're allowed to choose to do.
My girlfriend strips, has fun, never gets mistreated by anyone ever (i mean ever) and makes about $1500 per shift.
I sure hope they never let you or Brett Kavanaugh on the supreme court or the women of this country will be subjected to your solipsistic and self congradulating morality, more than they already are.
Do us New Yorkers a favor; stay in San Fran where your intolerance of others' choices seems to be better tolerated.
32
@jerome, Some of us just with we did not live in a world where there were other ways for women to make $1500 a shift without having to be physically beautiful and wearing a skimpy bunny costume for the pleasure of wealthy men. As you may know, the proportion of female executives, scientists, engineers, and other high level jobs remains very low.
6
Always a not-so-secret fantasy of mine was to be a Bunny. Unfortunately, born in 1968, the timing and opportunity never worked in my favor. I remain fascinated with the somewhat controversial history and impact of the Playboy brand and imagine I'll need to 'hop in' for a cocktail on my next NYC visit. In this era of cultural dissociative identity, between the popularity of Mad Men and the realities of #MeToo, it will be interesting to see if this reintroduction finds a profitable niche. I would have thought the Vegas location (which I did get a chance to visit) would have a better chance, but its closure after just six years suggests it was a fleeting novelty and not the embodiment of mass appeal nightlife. While the allure for me endures, a venue so rooted in bygone mores seems destined for failure, despite the pouffy tails. A Playboy Museum may have a better chance at long-term success.
23
Hopefully these young women are still physically protected from customers, as they used to be. Also that they get good health benefits. They're going to need them after waiting on tables in 3" spiked heeled shoes. Especially if they happen to slip and fall on those marble, tiled or wooden floors.
38
If women want and choose to do this work then more power to them!
52
Uh, no... I'll just leave it that...
16