The Playgirl (NSFW)

The Sex Root of a Gay Generation

The story of my first Playgirl magazine. Nudes & podcast for paid subscribers.

We all have a sexual “root,” a moment or media which imprints itself on us at a young age. For many Gay boys in the ‘80s and ‘90s, Playgirl was our root. The women’s answer to Playboy, it featured articles, quizzes and, of course, male centerfolds. Started in 1973, it ran until 2016 and recently revived.

Before the internet, male nudes were rare in mainstream media, mostly in erotic thrillers or late-night cable softcore. Playgirl was considered “respectable” erotica, in the top shelves of bookstore chains and convenience stores. 

One autumn day in 1993, my family was out on our Sunday garage sale hunt, the only shopping we could afford back then. My brother and I, ten and twelve, were playing in the back seat and my dad stopped for gas, then got back into the car giggling. “I got you something,” he told my mom, handing her a magazine. Everything in America was still new and thrilling to my parents. She flipped through the pages, flushed then giggled too. I peeked over right before she shoved the magazine under her seat and caught a glimpse of a naked man. 

It was as if a bomb went off in the car. My ears were ringing and my eyeballs dilated. Even then, I knew pretending I hadn’t seen it was the best idea. For the next few days, I searched everywhere for the magazine, praying she hadn’t thrown it away. I finally found the Playgirl hidden in a basket of old issues of McCall’s.

That Playgirl became my bible, the most prized possession I didn’t own. As soon as I’d hear my parent’s car leave the driveway, I’d run to the basket. I’d carefully mark the spot it was in then pore over every single page. The cover boasted Cher’s “Boy Toy REVEALED!” Articles about Madonna, RuPaul, Sandra Bernhard, cool shit that was not in McCall’s. And so. much. penis.

The centerfold was out of a 1970’s Tom of Finland drawing (I didn't know what that was then), a blonde landscaper with blue eyes and a mustache. The photo seared in my mind was him lying on his tummy on a bed, his bright red penis resting on a fuzzy blanket. Most poses were statuesque and unnatural, but this was intimate and tender. My eyes would dart from his penis to those crystal clear eyes. I imagined laying next to him and he’d tell me about his day, smelling of grass and sweat. He held his hand out and led me through the crossing of childhood to puberty. How I loved him.

Nearly all of the models were white, except for the “Man of the Month,” a long haired Latino in fisherman cosplay, complete with a necklace of tiny fishes and big balls that hung over colorful steps. The Latin lover trope was huge for white women in the ‘90s.

My favorite section was “Meet Your Man,” women sent in images of their husbands for a $250 prize. Polaroids of hairy, not always fit, dad-next-door types that really got my jaw grinding.

Porn is a drug of diminishing returns. Once I had the magazine so memorized that I could read it with my eyes closed, it stopped giving me the same rush. Even my love for the centerfold was not as strong as my desire, no, my need, for more. All I wanted in the world was to find another Playgirl. I was too scared to steal one, so I would just dream of Playgirls raining down on me, like pages from the burning library of Alexandria. It became my holy grail…

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“That’s disgusting,” my mom said, with a judgment I’d never heard. She was staring at the box, shaking her head. It was filled with passport photos and copies of Mexican birth certificates. This was the year after that first Playgirl. My uncle had just married a horrible woman. She had been arrested for fraud, pretending to be a paralegal processing poor people’s immigration papers. After posting bail, she and my uncle fled the country. 

“The people she fucked over are going to take anything that’s not bolted down. Come and take whatever you can use.” My uncle told my mom on the phone as he fled. We were too poor to decline on moral grounds, so we drove to their house to take anything that would fit in our car.

It was a strange thrill to be in someone else’s home to take anything. They had run away with stuff of real value, except for an ugly chandelier and a coffee table. My mom loaded up their cleaning supplies for her housekeeper job but left the bottles of shampoo and opened spices. To her, everything in the house had been tainted by the crime against our own people.

There wasn’t much for a twelve-year-old to be excited about, some board games, a shiny chess set made of glass. While my mom and dad loaded up the coffee table into the car, I walked into the bedroom. I opened their drawers, but they were empty. I opened the closet, which had been turned upside down in their packing. Piles of paperwork covered the floor. Then my eyes dilated.

There, sticking out of a pile of birth certificates, was a magazine. I recognized the sharp letters of the logo immediately. My heart started racing. A Playgirl. My very own. And nobody would know! I got dizzy with excitement.

I made sure my mom and dad were still outside while I figured out how I would sneak it out. Under my shirt? No, too dangerous. Maybe I could shove it in a board game.

She may have disgusted me a few moments earlier but I could have kissed that fraudulent bitch for finally giving me my fix. Maybe she was just a woman of the ‘90s and did what she had to? I negotiated with myself.

I pulled my precious out of the rubble…Of all the issues since the magazine’s first in 1973, it was the October, 1993. 

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Thirty years after I threw that second Playgirl in the trash, bitter at the cosmic joke, I was in the Castro in San Francisco, at store called Autoerotica. It buys and sells old Queer ephemera and porn, a museum where you can take home the treasures. Much of its inventory has been passed down from garage sales and estates of men taken by disease or time. I was pawing through the magazine section, old issues of Bear, Inches and Honcho. In the middle was a Playgirl section. 

At 42, I’ve seen a lot of Gay porn. Paper doesn’t excite me as it once did. But as I flipped through the Playgirl issues from 2014, then 2001, then 1999, my heart started racing. I flipped so fast I almost got a paper cut. 

Nestled in between magazines as it once had among the McCall’s, the October 1993 issue. That bright red penis on that blanket was mine once again for four dollars. 

One man’s porn is another man’s trash is another man’s sale is another man’s root.

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My favorite men from the October 1993 issue. NSFW! Paid subscribers only.