Playgirl's "Real Man of the Year"

[Misnomer]

(DISCLAIMER: I think this is the proper forum for this thread. At first I thought 'Cafe Society,' but I think it's really more of a MPSIMS thang. I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong. )

I cannot seem to take my eyes off Vince Barone, Playgirl's "Real Man of the Year" (September 2004)! His entire pictorial is very 'is it getting warm in here?' -- especially the look on his face on page 37. Yowsa!! I've been subscribing for just over a year, and this is the first time I've had the urge to scan one of the pictures and/or put a bookmark in the magazine. You Minneapolis women are soooo lucky... {sigh}





Ok, I think I feel better now.

[slortar]

Weird. I thought I was a shoe-in for that title.

[jk1245]

eh, he's gay


END: standard het male defense mechanism

[twickster]

Link?

[lieu]

Of course... and testicles too.

I don't think they'd have him in there if he was deformed.

[Paul in Qatar]

OK, so where can I see a photo of this studmuffin?

(If I were named Real Man f the Year by Playgirl, I would put it on my resume, just for fin.)

[Paul in Qatar]

I just did a Google on "Vince Barone." The first hit is for a guy in the Toronto city government. I presume it is not the VB. Bet he gets a lot of calls.

Found his photo on a Male Modeling site (rules here prohibiting me linking to a porn site). (Go to the kristian site, wait for it to load, he is the first guy on the 24th row.)

Anyway, a nice looking young man, not as nice as some, but to each his own.

[AskNott]

Let me check. Okay, this isn't GQ, where I'm in trouble.

Al Franken had a segment where he talked to a right-wing guy who had been on the list of Playgirl's sexiest something-or-other. Afterwards, he joked that most of Playgirl readers were gay men.

[Otto]

I think Playgirl's finally copped to its large gay readership (they used to deny it heatedly) and the last estimate I saw claimed their readership was something like 40% gay men.

Their oldest model ever that they had an issue or two ago is openly gay.

And July's centerfold? I had 'im, two weeks ago today.

[Kitchen Wench]

Originally Posted by Paul in Saudi

Anyway, a nice looking young man, not as nice as some, but to each his own.

I agree. My two faves from that page are Bruce Roberts & Jerry Penter. Way hotter.

[Misnomer]

Funny, I thought there would be at least one other Doper who gets the magazine, and who would have posted to agree/disagree with me. Perhaps I'm just the only one willing to admit it?

jk1245, it sooo doesn't matter if the guy in the pictures is straight or gay. It doesn't matter if he can spell his name, if he pulls the wings off butterflies, or if he hates black people. He just has to look ever-so-sexy in the photos, which Mr. Barone does quite nicely. Does anyone ever read the bio information about these guys, anyway? (Ok, so, I read the first few paragraphs...I had the irrational impulse to find out if there was a chance that he lived around here!) No need for defensiveness, though: real men beat magazine men every time.

There is absolutely no doubt that Playgirl has a significantly gay male readership. Hell, 90% of the ads are obviously targeted at gay men, as is some of the content. There is no such thing as porn targeted JUST at straight women -- not good porn, anyway. (It doesn't need a storyline or foreplay or 'sensitivity', dammit, just fewer lesbian scenes and better-looking men!)

Playgirl kind of sucks, anyway: the two columns are good, but everything else is hit-or-miss. I almost pitted it earlier this week, actually, but then I read the issue with Vince in it and became momentarily obsessed. I find lots of different kinds of men attractive, so I usually enjoy the pictorials in a general kind of way (though they seem to think that we enjoy seeing tiny mushroom caps), but there's just something about this guy that really works for me.

I thought I could 'share the joy,' but, again, I seem to be the only subscriber in the room...

[Misnomer]

Originally Posted by me

I thought I could 'share the joy,' but, again, I seem to be the only subscriber in the room...

Hmm, except maybe for Otto, but I can't really tell...

[astro]

Originally Posted by twickster

Link?

Here and

Here. He's a slender, hairless man.

[Ethilrist]

Sounds like Otto's got the premium subscription...

[Kitchen Wench]

I've bought precisely one issue of Playgirl in my life. And it was all for the thrill of being old enough to buy it. A girlfriend of mine and I looked through the pages when we got home, with many squeals and giggles. But after about an hour, I discovered that I'm not really into looking at some stranger's beans and franks. Plus, I prefer "regular" looking guys.

Truth be told, I enjoy the pics from Playboy over Playgirl. Woohoo! They really get some hotties for that mag! Oh, and the articles are great, too.

[Misnomer]

Originally Posted by astro

He's a slender, hairless man.

Well, not completely hairless, but you can't tell that from the G-rated photos in the links. Thanks for posting 'em!

Originally Posted by Ethilrist

Sounds like Otto's got the premium subscription...

That's for sure...LOL!

Originally Posted by Seeker74

I've bought precisely one issue of Playgirl in my life. And it was all for the thrill of being old enough to buy it.

Heh, I remember doing that, too: I thought I was so grown-up, buying a Playgirl at the one bookstore/newsstand in town that sold such things...

...I discovered that I'm not really into looking at some stranger's beans and franks.

IMHO it completely depends on the stranger.

Plus, I prefer "regular" looking guys.

For me, again, it depends on the guy. Sometimes the hottie knocks me out, but sometimes I don't get what the other women are making such a fuss about when it's that guy, over there, who's making my heart race. There are plenty of "regular"-looking guys I'd do in a heartbeat, but I too rarely get to see them naked...

Oh, and the [Playboy] articles are great, too.

Ya know, that's one of the things that bugs me about Playgirl: it's like 'porn lite' or something. Instead of being like Playboy, which provides killer pictures AND a great magazine, Playgirl thinks it just needs to provide two decent columns and some good pictures. They can just fill the rest in with crap about how they think single straight women live, ads for gay men, and boring sex toys that they try to pass off as daring. And the previous issue's erotica were all repeats from within the past year! They've temporarily redeemed themselves in my eyes with Vince's pictorial, and you don't see me cancelling my subscription, but the mag really can be a little ridiculous.

[Otto]

Originally Posted by Misnomer

Hmm, except maybe for Otto, but I can't really tell...

No, I don't subscribe (except for the free trial subscriptions they keep sending me).

[Shirley Ujest]

Those guys on the Kristen site are amusing.

Some of them are looking in their pants like they are surprised to see something there.

"Say 'allo to my widdle friend."

[twickster]

Seriously, misnomer, you think he's hot? I think he's just scrawny looking -- the way his pec sit on his chest is just weird.

Of course, he's less weird than the guy next to him on the Kristian site, Ryvan Alexander. Ewwwwwwwww....

[Jodi]

See, the home page of that site -- warning: dirty pictures! Do NOT peek from work or if you're under 18 or a fundamentalist etc. etc. -- the home page is basically everything I don't like about this stuff. It's so contrived: "I'm standing around in my jeans, I'm swigging from this water bottle, just another break from work, except whoops! my wangdoodle's hanging out." The same with similar pictures that show women allegedly doing everyday things in a "sexy" way: "Here I am in my office, very serious as you can tell from the glasses I'm wearing, and yes I do always answer the phone stark naked with my legs spread on the desk." It's terribly unsexy, IMO. Give me some good old fashioned nekkid-in-the-bedroom pictures that don't have the sexuality drained out of them, thankyewverymuch.

What? The guy? Yeah, he's cute. I like the fact he's not beefcaked up to the nth degree; I like a built guy, but not so built his physique says "horse steroids."

[chaoticbear]

What's the deal with calling him a "Real Man"? What kind of real men do you know that are that hairless? Bah, he waxes.

[Misnomer]

I've never been one to sit around with the girls and talk about men, and usually the Playgirl types don't do anything special for me (they just do the regular amount for me...heh). I don't regret starting this thread or anything, but it's not typical of me. I must have been a little, um, 'excited' the other night.

That said, I'm having fun...

Originally Posted by twickster

Seriously, misnomer, you think he's hot?

Oh yes. Whether or not you think he's cute, I don't think he can be called 'scrawny' -- 'lean,' sure. Normally I'd say "you can't judge just from one picture," but the second link provided by astro is a pretty good one. Representative-wise, I mean.

Originally Posted by Jodi

See, the home page of that site...is basically everything I don't like about this stuff. It's so contrived...

I see a distinction. I agree that the "oops, is that my penis??" pictures -- like some of the ones on that site -- aren't usually very sexy. But when they're in Playgirl, it's not an "oops" thing: the whole point of those pictures is that you can see what you're seeing, and 90% of the time the models don't try to pretend otherwise. I like the pictorials because they're straightfoward...I usually skip the pictures that accompany the erotica, though, because sometimes those can be a little on the "oops" side. Maybe it's a distinction that no one else sees, but it works for me.

What doesn't work for me is strip clubs: if I'm looking at that sort of thing live and in person, I either want to be getting some action or being completely ignored. (That, though, is my voyeuristic side talkin'.)

I like the fact he's not beefcaked up to the nth degree; I like a built guy, but not so built his physique says "horse steroids."

I agree completely. I don't care for 'scrawny,' but 'a little skinny' or 'lean' is fine by me, as is 'athletic,' 'average,' or 'muscular.' But the guys who are so pumped that they can no longer put their arms down at their sides almost never do anything for me. I'd rather have a guy whose build is on the soft side than someone who has confused himself with the governor of California.

Originally Posted by chaoticdonkey

What's the deal with calling him a "Real Man"? What kind of real men do you know that are that hairless? Bah, he waxes.

Oh, he definitely waxes.

(But there are men who naturally have no hair...on their chest, anyway.)

I probably should have explained this in my OP: the "Real Man" designation isn't used in the same way as, say, "real men don't eat quiche." Every issue contains a "Real Men" section, which contains amateur shots submitted by readers. They mean "real" as opposed to "model." (While Vince Barone is considered a 'model' now, when his picture was first submitted he was just a guy from Minneapolis.) Most of the guys are worse-than-average-looking (IMHO), but they try to be PC in terms of representing various age groups, ethnicities, etc. There is always a "Real Man of the Month," and -- as we know -- annually we have the "Real Man of the Year." I've only been subscribing for a little over a year, but for my money Vince Barone is the best "Real Man" to come out of the magazine yet.