It’s not every day Playboy comes to town soliciting college women for the magazine’s annual “College Girls” issue. In fact it’s not even every year.

It’s been five years since Playboy visited Raleigh looking for the “Girls of the ACC.”

Interested women were just a photo interview away from the ACC College Girls layout for the October 2009 issue. The issue will be on news stands and at www.playboydigital.com on Friday, September 11, 2009.

Playboy’s visits are rare, but they still spark the years old question of whether trying out for the magazine is a fun thing or an invitation to be exploited.

The women who showed up to audition were part of the first camp, but they were still extremely nervous before they came to the shoot — most had no previous modeling experience and did not know what to expect.

Haley Leclair, a sophomore in English, said that she came in feeling nervous but that the photographer put her at an ease.

“I was anxious but I was excited. I had to tell myself to just be myself and to be as comfortable as possible,” she said. “The photographer made me feel extremely comfortable and overall it was a good experience.”

Raleigh was selected as a scouting location for the ACC playboy college girl search for the first time since 2004. The playboy scouting has not only been a controversial event for students and faculty, but a difficult subject to talk about.

Kim Mizuno, a contributing photographer for Playboy that has worked with the company around 23 years, was the scout for the Raleigh location.

Mizuno conducted 20-minute-long interviews and photo shoots with the contenders. The process included an I.D. check and scanning, a brief questionnaire and a seven to ten picture bikini and/or topless photo-shoot.

Mizuno said that girls who participated in this photo shoot had a lot of courage.

“I don’t care how tough you are, it’s not easy to do it,” she said.

Mizuno said that people have to look past the misconceptions that are associated with women that participate with Playboy and that many parents approve of their children in participating in the ACC layout.

“They have to realize that the girls come from all different walks of life. A lot of the mothers called, because they wanted their daughters to come in to Playboy,” Mizuno said.

Michelle Marlan, a senior is psychology and a participant in the photo-shoot, said that the annual shoot was an empowering event for women that well-represented the ACC Schools just like any sports team would be representing their school.

“It’s a good way to represent your school and the pride you have for it. I believe it’s empowering and a good way to represent N.C. State at its finest,” Marlan said.

However, some students opposed this event and said that Playboy shed a demeaning light on women.

Christina Searano, a senior in criminology, said Playboy’s search is demeaning to women and promotes a negative patriarchal culture.

“When you devalue women [with Playboy] to the status of objects it leads men to not consider them as a whole person, and when you don’t consider them as a whole person, you don’t think about their feelings and how you treat them,” she said.

Haley Raimondi, a close friend of Searano’s and a senior in sociology and French, took a similar stance and added that Playboy promoted to the ideology of abuse and rape of women.

“Participating in something such as Playboy allows men to objectify women and leads to ideologies involved in rape culture,”

 Raimondi said.

Both girls said that steps needed to be taken in order to dissuade women from participating in the ACC shoot and to stop Playboy from returning to campus.

Raimondi said action needed to be taken the next time the ACC scouts came to campus. She also said that education was the best weapon to fight Playboy.

“I think some type of action needs to be taken the next time they come. Education is essential,” she said. “The campus and the rest of society needs to be educated on these issues, because unfortunately most of them are not. Education is the first step to preventing Playboy from coming to campus again as well as changing the ideologies of out culture.”

Searano agreed and said she was concerned about the negative influence of society on women and said that women should speak out against injustices being done to them.

“Society has limited women’s choices. Their [women’s] pathways are set by society. It’s extremely important to to work against these pathways. It is so important for people to get involved in this [movement against Playboy] and not allow this cycle of degradation of women to continue. Silence speaks acceptance,” said Searano.