The difference between Marilyn Monroe and the early Pamela Anderson is not that great. What’s amazing is that the taste of American men and international tastes in terms of beauty have essentially stayed the same. Styles change, but our view of beauty stays the same.

Hefner is arguing for continuity in mainstream ideals of female beauty across decades, using two iconic sex symbols—Marilyn Monroe (mid‑20th century) and Pamela Anderson (1990s)—as reference points. The claim distinguishes surface-level fashion (“styles change”) from deeper cultural preferences (“our view of beauty stays the same”), implying that mass desire is stable and widely shared (“American men and international tastes”). Read in light of Hefner’s role in shaping and marketing a particular erotic aesthetic, the remark also functions as a defense of Playboy’s enduring brand logic: if the underlying ideal persists, then the magazine’s visual formula can be presented as reflecting, rather than manufacturing, cultural taste.