DAME Magazine: Alabama vs. Dildo's

The article in DAME Magazine about the Sex Toys for Troy King is now available online.

Alabama vs. Dildos
Attorney General Troy King stands hard against stimulators

By David Holthouse
Published: Dec 10, 2007

Last November 15th, UPS delivered a box to Alabama Attorney General Troy King. Inside was a “Ms. Piglet” blow-up sex doll. “The Original Inflatable Party Pig” was a gift from Loretta Nall, 33, a popular Alabama blogger, Libertarian activist and former gubernatorial candidate (“Vote Nall, Y’all”) who spearheaded a “Sex Toys for Troy King” drive in protest of Alabama’s “Anti-Obscenity Enforcement Act.” That law criminalizes the sale of dildos, clitoral vibrators or any other “…device designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs.

“What’s next, knobby cucumbers?” says Nall.

According to the actual language of the law, sex toys are obscene because they promote a “prurient interest in autonomous sex” through “the pursuit of orgasm by artificial means.” Its penalties are stiff. While selling a handgun to a child is a trivial crime in Alabama punishable by no more than a $500 fine, violators of the dildo ban are subject to one year of prison or hard labor as well as a $10,000 fine.

In other words, Alabama lawmakers deemed that G-spot stimulators in the hands of consenting adults are more of a threat to public safety and welfare than Glock .45s in the hands of children.

“The difference is, firearms are not inherently immoral,” says Rev. Dan Ireland, executive director of the Alabama Citizens Action Program, a coalition of conservative Baptist preachers and activists who claim to serve as “Alabama’s moral compass.”

“There are moral ways and immoral ways to use a firearm,” says Ireland, whose organization is clamoring for stringent enforcement of the dildo ban. “There is no moral way to use one of these devices [sex toys].”
READ THE REST

Here is Dan Ireland's email address if anyone would like to inform him that he does not serve as a "moral compass" for every citizen of this state. I'm sure he'd love to hear from you. After all, everyone needs a good dose of reality once in a while.

Many thanks to David Holthouse and DAME Magazine for this story. Still waiting on the one in Rolling Stone. Was talking to Peter Wilkinson from RS just a few minutes ago about the Webster Alexander Principal story. Hope they decide to bust that predatory fuck-wad in the nuts with another scathing RS article. Didn't mention to Peter the Troy King blurb slated for the Desk of National Affairs because he isn't the one who wrote the piece. Will update everyone on that one when I get new info.

Heads Up!

Our good friend and master cartoonist J.D. Crowe has up a toon teaser for today's editorial cartoon from the Mobile Press-Register. It will have to do with sex toy Troy...if you guess what it will be exactly then you win a prize. Y'all head over to JD's place and give'er a go!

I am on my way to New Orleans until Sunday for the International Drug Policy Reform Conference. If you need me I am available via email or cell phone.

Y'all hold the fort down til I get back....and no Troy this does not mean you will have a few blessed days of peace and quiet. Thanks to the internet I can make your life miserable from virtually anywhere on earth.

Monday Morning Rambling's

Over the weekend I took my son to Mobile for Open House at Alabama School of Mathematics & Science. Wow!! What a place!! If you have never been let me just tell you that it is an old Cathedral converted into an ultra-modern and high tech learning environment. Just as an example they teach five foreign languages. Spanish, German, French, Greek & Latin. Sixty percent of their faculty have Phd's and their staff is one assembled from an international pool. A really astounding place and the kids all looked so happy to be there. Basically, I don't care who I might have to bribe....I want my son in that school for his junior and senior years.

While in Mobile I called up J.D. Crowe, editorial cartoonist for the Mobile Press-Register and invited him out for a beer and a handshake for the two fabulous cartoons that he penned just recently:
Sex Toys for Troy and turkey baster.

JD and I met up at Hero's on Dauphin Street where he was kind enough to present me with the original Sex Toys toon with a dedication. I am most proud of the toon and plan to frame it in gold and hang it where I can see it upon leaving and returning home. JD is a very cool dude in my book and I enjoyed the hour or so we had to laugh and cut up over our elected officials. Thanks JD...we must do it again when we have more time.

Yesterday I met with most of the rest of my activist group. We are all going to New Orleans later this week to the International Drug Policy Reform Conference and I wanted to make sure everyone had all of their ducks in a row. I had two large laminated posters of the sex toy cartoon made and I had them with me to show my friends. One of them said, "Hey, we ought to go by Love Stuff and give them one of the posters." She called them up to make sure they were open and we headed that way. A couple members of our group expressed doubt that they would be open on Sunday in Alabama. However, while it is illegal in most places in Alabama to sell alcohol on Sunday there are no such prohibitions of adult novelty items.

The ladies at the store were thrilled by the poster and asked me to sign it for them. Here's a pic.


We took other photos as well but they are really not appropriate for posting. Yes..it's true....even I have limits when it comes to what I will put on my blog. My kids read this every day and they are not ready to see mom clowning around in an adult novelty store.

I did find out that Love Stuff has a website where you can order online. I looked for one when I started my sex toy drive but was unable to locate it. For the record their web address is http://www.lovestuffusa.net and they have an inflatable pig just like the one I sent Troy. So, if you have not yet mailed your gift to our wonderful and most deserving Attorney General let me encourage you to visit the Love Stuff link and send Troy some Holiday JOY!

Some Linky Love

Thought I'd spend a few minutes returning the love of all the bloggers across the world who have picked up the "Sex Toys for Troy King story and run with it.

This first one I am really, really, really proud of.
Alabama Deer Talk
Even the deer hunters, who are normally thought to be part of Troy King's unshakable base, are sending him some toys. I mean that is right up in the middle of his camp. It doesn't get much better than that in Alabama, folks. Thanks Alabama Deer Talk!

I hear that Fleshbot also picked it up, but I can't seem to find it on their site. WARNING: NSFW or many other places. Extreme hardcore porn site. You were warned.

Got an email last night from a former Alabamian who fled to California years ago and the title of the email was "God Bless You and that Little Piggy Too!" I howled when I read it so I thought I'd share it with y'all.

--Dear Loretta,

Thank you for giving sanity a voice behind the cotton curtain. I was
raised in Oxford and lived in B'ham for about 6 years. I escaped to
California in 1994.

Your sextoy drive is brilliant. I'll ship him a cockring or maybe
some lube called Built to Fuck! Alabama is so sexually repressed!
I'm so glad a woman is fighting for change. This country needs more
women like you.
Best regards,
This person heard about me at GAYVN

Here is a long list of linked in sites provided by Technorati. Spend some time visiting them if you can because the comments are priceless as are some of the posts. Other people's takes on this are just superb!

Doc's Political Parlor

Framed

I can't believe this hasn't been Farked yet. If someone out there reading this has a Fark account please send this in. Someone might also consider Metafilter-ing it if they have an account there.

There are more links which I will attempt to list today.

Nall Adds Humor to Sex Toy Debate

Tuscaloosa News
Editorials
Published Friday, November 16, 2007

Nall adds humor to sex toy debate
Loretta Nall, the clown princess of Alabama politics, is at it again.

Nall campaigned for governor in 2006 on the Libertarian ticket. When a political columnist drew attention to her cleavage, she didn't like it at first. But she turned the publicity to her advantage, raising campaign funds by selling T-shirts with her photo and the slogan, "More of these boobs!! And less of these boobs." Beneath the slogan were pictures of Bob Riley, Lucy Baxley and other candidates.

Now the free-spirited Nall is taking on Alabama's straitlaced attorney general, Troy King.

King is considering asking the Legislature to amend the state's anti-obscenity law. A Jefferson County judge ruled this month that part of the law was too vague to force closure of a sex toys store in Hoover.

In 1998, the Legislature passed a law banning the sale of sex toys in Alabama. Lower courts found it unconstitutional in 1999 and 2002, saying Alabama did not prove a legitimate interest in regulating sale of sex toys to adults. But the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the law in 2004, claiming there is no constitutional right to sexual privacy.

The appeals justices did note that Alabama could repeal the ban if residents decide "a prohibition on sex toys is misguided, or ineffective, or just plain silly."

It is all of those things.

"It's absolutely outrageous an attorney general would squander our tax dollars and barge into our bedrooms and tell us what we can and cannot do in Alabama," Nall says. "We have real crime in Alabama."

So she has organized a "Sex Toys for Troy King" drive, in which she encourages people to mail the devices to the AG's office in Montgomery.

Earlier this week, she sent King an inflatable pig.

We aren't delusional enough to believe that her drive will have any impact on changing the law. But it does point out its absurdities in a humorous way. It's good to have someone like Nall to enliven Alabama's buttoned-down political scene.
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Thanks to Ben Windham and the T-Town News for this editorial.