And proudly declare our possession of *more than 5* vibrators. Because now we can! And before we couldn’t, without fear of prosecution. (It would have been assumed that we were dealing, because nobody could need more than 5 for personal use.) And we can even *call* them what they are. So can people selling them. To see some of the lengths folks used to have to go to in order to sell vibrators, watch this wonderful video featuring Molly Ivins.
For more on the many and fascinating ways that vibrators have been conceived of and marketed, see Rachel Maines’s wonderful The Technology of Orgasm. (Short story: they were perfectly respectable home health aids, used to treat one’s wandering womb by inducing a hysterical paroxysm. Which wasn’t sexual. No not at all.) H/T Feministe.
Feminist Philosophers 