"Browns loyalty to the free market extended beyond the workplace and into the far more intimate arena of sexuality. She viewed women's sexuality in the context of Capitalist exchanges, where those with the money had certain degrees of power and those without tried to negotiate as best they could. For Brown, feminism could improve women's bargaining position, but it would not ultimately take sexuality, any more than it would take 2work, outside of Capitalism's reaches. With Cosmopolitan, Brown would create, market, and further a female sexual marketplace in which both the inequities and the pleasures of a liberated sexuality within Capitalism system would become apparent and open to negotiation. She offered readers articles such as "Never Be Faithful To A Married Man," and "What If?" a piece about what sexual relationships would be like if there was no bartering system in place, "with women trying to get to the highest possible price for their wares (marriage, a continuing annuity) and men working for bargains." The acquisition of sexual freedom for women was, as far as Brown was concerned, tied to the marketplace for better or worse.
"Many critics of Cosmopolitan concluded that Brown's cavalier attitude about women trading sexual favors for dinners or nights out promoted the prostitution of women. Brown herself then fell into line with the most radical of feminists, who were considering the ways in which marriage itself mirrored prostitution. "Many a woman who is married is in a sense a prostitute," she claimed," in that she accepts presents, money, automobiles, country-club memberships, trips to Europe and the good life from a man she can barely tolerate in bed." As for women who accepted things from men they were not married to, Brown wrote, "I feel she's less of a prostitute than the married woman who hates the bed relationship." Brown refused to call her "girl" a prostitute. Her lover was simply, "making her life better," than it was. As Brown saw it, "In a way, we're all prostitute." Helen Gurley Brown's politics was steeped in political and economic understanding of sexuality. steeped in personal observations and experience, and it made many people, including many feminists, uneasy."
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