Bad Vibrations: Where Dildos Still Get You Hard Time

The creators of Ms. Piglet, an inflatable blow-up sex doll, probably had many uses in mind when they conceived of her, but chances are they never thought she’d grace the floors of an Attorney General’s office—at least not as a political ploy.

But in November 2007, Ms. Piglet was sent to Troy King, the Alabama Attorney General, as part of the “Sex Toys for Troy” campaign. The brainchild of Loretta Nall, a former libertarian gubernatorial candidate and political activist, the campaign is in protest to the state’s Anti-Obscenity Enforcement Act, which prohibits the sale of any device that is used “for the stimulation of human genital organs.”

Yes, that’s right dear lovers of Rabbits, Magic Wands, Power Dancers, and Ms. Piglets, the Heart of Dixie wants to make the electrical orgasm illegal.

Were it not for the punishment, you’d think the Alabama law was a farce. But in the same state where selling a gun to a kid gets you a $500 fine, selling a sex toy can run you up to $10,000 in fines and up to a year of jail time. And the law is not a relic from yore; it was put on the books in 1998.

Not surprisingly, the ban on sex toys hasn’t gone without significant legal protest. The American Civil Liberties Union and local sex shop owners filed suit in 1998, arguing that the ban was unconstitutional. A federal district court overturned the law, and King’s office protested. Lower courts upheld the law, and in February 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal to the vibrator ban. Another bill recently passed by the house seeks to repeal the ban once again.

While anyone within spitting distance of a Good Vibrations might question the priorities of the Alabama government, they aren’t the only state where politicians feel the need to act as moral arbiters for the masses. Similar sex toy statutes exist in Mississippi and Virginia. Courts have only recently repealed laws in Louisiana, Kansas, Colorado, and Georgia barring “obscene” devices.