Joanne Webb

After a CNN story broke about a Texas
woman being arrested for selling sex toys in December 2003, I immediately began researching it further. After all, I was not only personally curious as to the circumstances, but professionally interested as I make every attempt to ensure that my corporation is operating within the law. Needless to say, I was concerned and wanted to know the details.

After spending some time going to various Texas newspapers online I learned that the woman's name was Joanne and that she was not only arrested, but is facing $4,000 in legal fees and one year jail time for selling adult sex toys.

You may remember that the Supreme Court struck down the Texas sodomy law in 2003, with Justice Anthony Kennedy writing that "The petitioners are entitled to respect for their private lives. The state cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime." Unless, apparently, those petitioners use sex toys.

Joanne Webb, a former fifth-grade teacher, is a Burleson, TX, suburban mother and part-time saleswoman for a company called Passion Parties, Inc. She is also in the middle of one of the most ridiculous criminal cases. Joanne provides adult novelties that are sold at Tupperware-type house parties. These parties are educational and great for people who feel more comfortable buying marital aids in a private home than at an adult bookstore or on the Internet.

Acting on a tip last month, two undercover officers went to the office of Joanne's husband, a homebuilder, where Joanne helps out with clerical work. Joanne had placed a small sign in the window advertising her parties. The undercover male and female officers asked if they could look at a product catalog. Joanne of course provided them one and the "couple" then placed an order for two items. Joanne said she tried to talk them into hosting a party to help other couples, but when they declined, she agreed to sell them the items. She retrieved the items from her home and the "couple" came back later to her husband's office to pick them up. One month later, an officer called her and said a warrant had been issued for her arrest on charges that she had sold obscene devices, a violation of state law.

According to the state's obscenity code, an obscene device is a simulated sexual organ or item designed to stimulate the genitals. It specifically refers to dildos, vibrators, and vaginal shaped toys. In my opinion, whomever enacted this law is obviously a repressed individual who has nothing better to do then to enforce their own unhealthy sexual repression on others through a legal enforcement.

Laws such as these is why you will see many adult stores posting signs that say "sold only as novelties" as we do on this site. However, considering that we educate people how to use the toys may very well make the point of doing this a mute one. Regardless, I do everything I can to legally protect my sexual health oriented business so that people all over the world may embrace their sexuality and be educated about it in a healthy, ethical and beautiful way.

After reading Joanne's story I was so outraged at her plight that I personally called her to provide her with my moral support and provided she and her lawyer with a letter stating it. My letter, along with many other supporters will go into the court hearing to show that the majority of people feel that this law prohibiting the sale of sex toys is wrong.

For one thing, it is legal to own a sex toy in Texas, so the law prohibiting the sale of one contradicts the right of a Texan to purchase one in their home state!

In addition, what was more troubling to me was the hidden story. While I read many articles about Joanne's unjust situation I kept wondering what the real reason was for these absurd charges to be brought against her. To me it was obvious someone locally had a personal issue with Joanne and used their influence to make their attacks on her a legal one. So the nagging question that kept running through my mind was who is the insecure bully that wants to take out their issues with Joanne in such an unjust and immature way.

Bill Moore, the Johnson County attorney prosecuting the case, declined to be interviewed, saying through his office manager that he doesn't discuss pending cases with the media but I can tell you that reports of his staff being outraged that he is going through with the prosecution has been reported in several newspapers.

When I spoke with Joanne I empathized with how hard this must be for her and her family and I was terribly saddened to hear that her arrest had caused Chris, her husband of 20 years, to suffer a nervous breakdown from the stress of this absurd and legal injustice.

Joanne also said she was amazed that the town's narcotics squad would be put on the case. "We have a real problem with drugs in our schools,'' she said, "and they're using our narcotics officers to entrap me for selling a vibrator.''

Joanne said it had occurred to her that sex products might not go over so well in a conservative county where even liquor sales are banned. But Passion Parties are actually quite popular in the Bible Belt states of Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi, with sales second only to California. Therefore, Joanne reasoned that many women in her community would benefit as well. Also, with the economy doing so badly since Bush began his term, her husband's construction business has been slow and Joanne's family needed the extra income. "I felt like I was teaching again," Joanne said regarding the parties.

Joanne knew that some people disapproved of her business, but she understood that there is always gossip about such things. However, beyond the sex toys, what the true trigger was for this insanity was that she was wearing miniskirts. BeAnn Sisemore, Joanne's lawyer, said that the pastors of two churches, uncomfortable with her appearance, had asked her to move to other congregations.

Can I just pause and ask what is the deal with that? Is that what Christianity is about? Conformity, judgment, repression, control, and discrimination? I guess the pastors need to ask themselves the favorite Christian question- What would Jesus do? From what I have studied of the bible that is the exact opposite!

At a chamber meeting, a few women asked Joanne to stop selling her products. Not long after that conversation, the Ambassadors moved to adopt a dress code that prohibited miniskirts. Wait, are we in the year 2004 now or 1904?

Joanne indicated to me that she was going to continue what she felt was the right thing to do and not let these uptight bullies get the best of her. Her 13-year-old son tried to make her feel better by saying he read about the Texas obscenity statute online at DumbLaws.com and it sure is just that!

Because Joanne had explained to the undercover officers how to use the products, she crossed the line, Joanne's lawyer said. "This law is about how you represent what the product is for. I can have the most obnoxious item in the world, and as long as I call it a 'novelty,' I can sell it all day long. If I educate you on how to use it, it's illegal."

So basically some hypocritical laws in Texas say that you can own a sex toy and use it to stimulate yourself sexually, but you cannot sell it and indicate what it is for. So that would mean that anyone selling sex toys can show them to you, and sell them to you as a "novelty" while giving you a "wink, wink, nudge, nudge."

God forbid we actually talk about what it is we are selling, and teach people to embrace their sexuality... let's just keep everyone in the dark so we can continue to dumb down our society to the point of not even knowing the basics about sexuality.

If I sometimes sound frustrated with such conservative attitudes in this article, well, to be honest sometimes I am. The following comment is what prompted me to call Joanne and offer my support-

Sgt. Havens of the Burleson police department sounded disgusted when he said this of Joanne selling sex toys... Burleson leaders knew about her business – it's her unapologetic efforts to discuss sexuality with her female clients that ruffle feathers the most. "She's not very bashful about it, she talks about it like we talk about changing our oil."

So from that statement I gather that the attitude of these Burelson "leaders" is that we should use and sell sex toys, but lie about what they are for and be very ashamed at mentioning sex at all.

It is time that people that think this way need to truly look at what they are saying... they are asking people to lie and feel shame about something that is natural, normal, healthy and beautiful. It's just sex, not murder, not war, not anything terrible... just sex. We should be able to talk about it with the same uninhibited honesty as we talk about changing our oil!

Joanne endured over a year of absolute upheaval from the case by being made to feel like a woman wearing a scarlet letter in her own town. She fought to stay out of trouble with 1 year in prison and $4,000.00 in fees on the line. Yet the case was dropped a few months ago, most likely from the sheer embarrassment that it caused the district attorney's office when Joanne brought international attention to it through media appearances in newspapers, radio interviews and on television.

She is now pondering whether to proceed with a law suit against the state of Texas for their current law against selling sex toys while educating customers about them as being unconstitutional. She has until November 2005 to decide and is currently examining whether or not to proceed.

Update- 2-14-08

NEW ORLEANS, La. — A three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans has overturned a Texas law from the 1970s that makes it a crime to promote or sell sex toys in the state.

The 2-1 opinion referenced the U.S. Supreme Court's 2003 decision in Lawrence v. Texas that struck down a Texas law that prohibited private consensual sex among people of the same gender. That ruling created a broad if undefined constitutional right to sexual privacy.

"Whatever one might think or believe about the use of these [sex toy] devices," Justice Thomas M. Reavley wrote in the 5th Circuit opinion, "government interference with their personal and private use violates the Constitution.

Free Speech Coalition FAQs About Sale of Sex Toys In Texas Now