Secrets of Playboy shatters whatever remains of Hugh Hefner's legacy

BuzzFeed News

"This gruesome and unflinching 10-part series brings out the women — and valets and butlers — who witnessed rapes, coerced sex work, nonconsensual surveillance, and a toxic labor culture at the company," says Alessa Dominguez, adding: "Throughout the 10 episodes, we hear from a plethora of people at different levels of the hierarchy: from the servers and greeters at the clubs to the Playmates in front of the cameras to the bunny 'mothers' tasked with guiding them and even the corporate employees who worked in promotion. They were, in many ways, the workers that kept the empire running and experienced the brunt of the toxicity...The Holmby Hills Playboy Mansion became a fantasy playground for many men. But according to Secrets of Playboy, it was rife with sexual harassment and secret recording devices. The security guards had cameras, there were more set up in supposedly private rooms, and women were photographed and recorded without their consent. Celebrities like Tony Curtis could threaten a lawsuit when they realized they had been caught on tape, but most of the women didn’t have that kind of power. And the recordings and photographs were used as leverage — or collateral — to keep women from speaking out about what they experienced. It wasn’t just Hefner himself, but also all the men around him who perpetuated a culture of escalating violence."