PRINTLate night goes naughty
Home-shopping channels never felt so good
Katharine Johnson
May 22, 2008 | 12:00 a.m. CST
It’s 2 a.m., and sleep just isn’t happening. You go to the fridge, grab a bite to eat and flip on the TV. While surfing cable channels, you stop on Oxygen. Maybe you’ll see Hope Floats or possibly that teen pregnancy drama that grandma loves.
Suddenly, you’re confronted with a hummingbird, a scorpion, a jack rabbit and a dolphin. But it’s not a nature show. The “animals” on display are sex toys. It’s amusing and slightly confusing. Welcome to the world of Shop Erotic, cable TV’s late-night romp on the wild side.
Shop Erotic is not pornography, though many of the items for sale have roles in those films. The intimate shopping show, hosted by author and entrepreneur Miyoko Fujimori, sells naughty novelties for men, women and couples.
Considering the circumstances, late night on Oxygen is the perfect airtime for this steamy show. It directly follows Talk Sex with Sue Johanson, which gets the audience thinking dirty in advance.
Sex toys, along with other adult novelties, are not something that many people are comfortable talking about, yet their manufacture and sale are part of a multi-billion-dollar industry. So how can products that make so much money be something that people are quick to purchase, use and hide in a drawer?
American conservative cultural norms often discourage taking pillow talk outside the bedroom. Sometimes people don’t even talk to their own partners about their sexual needs and desires, which, according to some experts, is a must in all relationships. “It’s easy to have OK sex,” Fujimori says. “But when you’re married and dealing with schedules and you have kids and stuff, it actually changes.”
Television is just one of the many mediums people compare their lives to. Yet, social norms have changed considerably in the past 50 years, according to Nellie Symm-Gruender, co-owner of the three Passions stores in mid-Missouri.
“When I see Oprah Winfrey having shows about erotica during the middle of the day, that says to me that the adult industry is coming into its own and is becoming more mainstream,” says Symm-Gruender who also sits on the board of directors for the Free Speech Coalition, a trade association for the adult entertainment industry.
Some could argue that showing sex-toy ads during the late-night hours on Oxygen is over-the-top. But Barb Brents, associate professor of sociology at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, says this is a statement about how far women have come in social terms.
“Women weren’t supposed to like sex in the 1950s,” Brents says. “Now we’ve come to appreciate women’s sexual activity — women can be sexual actors.”
Brents is conducting research on the sex industry in Nevada and adds that the “cultural norm of consumption” — what people in today’s society buy and how they do it — figures into the sex-toy industry.
“We purchase not just products but feelings and emotions,” Brents says. “It’s our consumer repertoire to buy pleasure.”
Yet Shop Erotic doesn’t seems to be hurting local business sales. “If anything, it gives us more business because it brings people in with special requests,” says Lacretia Cooke, lingerie manager at Venus Adult Megastore. “People want the things they see on television right away if it’s possible.”
When it comes to toys themselves, Fujimori says that with such a variety of toys and ways of personal pleasure, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what people need. She suggests the Pocket Rocket, a clitoris stimulator, for women. For men, her suggestion is the Masturbator Sleeve. And for couples, any kind of vibrating ring is the ultimate recommendation because it not only helps the male hold his erection longer but also stimulates the clitoris thus promising maximum pleasure for both partners.
Fujimori’s favorite thing about the business is the expansion and popularity of something that has been kept hush-hush for so long. “Shop Erotic is helping bring sex toys to the mainstream for people to enhance relationships, to talk about and be more open about this part of our lives,” Fujimori says. “Because it’s been such a taboo thing in American culture, that is really good to see.”
