It's Not Easy Being Naughty

“In olden days, a glimpse of stocking

Was looked on as something shocking.

But now, God knows,

Anything goes…”

--from “Anything Goes” by Cole Porter

It’s getting harder and harder to be a naughty girl. Back in the old days, a little cleavage or a lot of thigh…or both…made pulses race. There was a little bit of power in being provocative.

But now, even the venerable Playboy Magazine has thrown up its metaphorical hands at dropping literal pants. Because the nudes in Playboy just aren’t that shocking anymore.

Playboy debuted its first issue, shown here, in 1953

Playboy’s CEO, Scott Flanders, concedes, “You're now one click away from every sex act imaginable for free. And so it's just passé at this juncture."

It used to be that Playboy was the magazine that boys of all ages bought on the sly, its cover papered over to protect the innocent shopgoer. In the mid-70s, the magazine reached 5.6 million readers. Today, i’s down to about 800,000.

So if sex no longer sells, what does that say for the women in real lif? The ones who never made it to a centerfold, either because their scruples were too high or their “assets” were too low?

It means that it is going to take a lot more to get pulses racing. Perhaps the next step is to slowly…and seductively…put on an item of clothing.