Shopping Mall remains firmly rooted in the 19th century:
I wrote about Sherri Williams v. Alabama in 2005 (“Do You Have an Rx for That Vibrator?“), describing the battle Sherri fought to keep her Pleasures stores open after Alabama banned sex toy retail “for immoral purposes” from the state. I wrote about the case again in 2007 when the U.S. Supreme Court refused to consider Sherri’s appeal (“Chaste Home, Alabama, Where You Can’t Buy a Dildo“).
Now Sherri is in the news again: she has opened a Pleasures store with a drive-thru window, right there in Huntsville, Alabama. I’m impressed by her ingenuity and persistence.
Sex toy drive-thru: Alabama shop to offer window service
Williams said Alabama is the last state in the U.S. to have a sex toy ban. The anti-obscenity law had been sponsored by state Sen. Tom Butler in 1998, but Alabama officials said the sex toy ban was not intentional but the result of borrowing language from other states with similar laws.
But Alabama law also makes an exception to the ban on the sale of items designed for the “stimulation of human genital organs” if the sale was for “a bona fide medical, scientific, educational, legislative, judicial or law enforcement purpose.”
Williams said customers cannot purchase a sex toy unless they fill out a medical questionnaire describing the health-related reasons for their purchase.
