I love Alabama, don't get me wrong. But damn, don't these people have anything better to do?
How Appealing has this interesting bit. Apparently someone in Alabama thinks people should not be allowed to buy sex toys. Messr. Bashman's correspondent reports:
Senior Judge Hill was funny as hell, and rather forceful in the view that this was an absurd law. Choice paraphrases of what he said:
"What exactly is it that you're trying to protect Alabamians from? What's the horror here?"
Yeah, if you want to shout "Oh God, we're coming," you can do it with the clowns protesting that 10 Commandments statue!
"Next thing you know, you'll be banning bathing suits, and then on to burkas."
If this is the best that Alabama can produce, then you'd have to ban burkas too. Because in this case, a well-placed burka would enhance sexual pleasure.
"When I was young, condom packages said 'for medical use only.' Could a vendor lawfully sell these devices if they had a label that said 'only for the treatment of psychological needs within a marriage relationship'?"
Wait...marriage relationships are about psychological needs, not just this? Did I miss something?
The State also relied on what I call the Brookstone defense, which was something like, "if you want to buy such a device, just buy one of the readily available things that is marketed for other purposes but easily adaptable to stimulation of the genitals." Somehow or another, in the State's view, this saves the constitutionality of the statute.
I bet stores in Alabama do fairly brisk business in cucumbers and electric toothbrushes.
The courtroom, by the way, was full of high school students. Don't know if they knew what was on the docket and came on purpose in connection with some class, or if they just luckily stumbled in to a day full of cases that involved child porn, vibrators, and a high school principal seeking qualified immunity despite having severely beaten a student with a metal walking stick for no good reason.
OK kids, who wants to be a lawyer when they grow up?