ARDEN-ARCADE, Calif. – I’m often struck by how much public perception of adult entertainment has changed over the last 30 years, a shift I think it’s reasonable to largely attribute to the arrival and expansion of internet porn.

The internet offered people a means of exploring porn without revealing themselves in the process. Suddenly, there was no need to risk being seen entering an adult shop, or raising the eyebrows of a convenience store clerk by requesting one of those black plastic-wrapped magazines they keep behind the counter, perhaps just below their selection of cigarette rolling papers.

Porn has become so mainstream these days, it’s almost possible to forget how much anger its mere presence and availability can cause – until you read about a new brick-and-mortar adult store opening somewhere, over the loud objections of some of the area’s residents.

Take the new Hustler Hollywood store preparing to open its doors in Arden-Arcade (a city of around 90,000 people located just east of Sacramento), for example; you’d never know it was opening its doors in an age of greater social acceptance of porn, were you to judge by the response of some outraged locals.

“It’s ridiculous. The county doesn’t seem to know what is going on in the neighborhood,” said Mike Seaman, a board member of the Fulton-El Camino Recreation and Park District. [Editor’s Note: I did not make up this guy’s last name.]

“They seem to think anything is better than nothing,” Seaman added.

What Seaman and others are upset about, apparently, isn’t just the idea of having a Hustler-branded store in their neighborhood, but the notion the store is getting away with something, by classifying itself as a “lingerie store,” rather than as an “adult novelty” shop – the latter being something they seem to believe they could prevent from opening under relevant local zoning ordinances.

Under Sacramento county zoning regulations, an adult novelty store is defined as an “establishment that, as one of its principal business purposes, offers for sale or rental for any form of consideration instruments, devices or paraphernalia that are designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs for anything of pecuniary value.”

The general business license issued to HH Sacramento LLC, the company which will be operating the Hustler Hollywood store, stipulates that “adult novelty items shall not exceed 25 percent of the display area.”

Accepting this specification and the general business license reportedly allowed Hustler Hollywood to avoid a public review process which would have subjected the store to additional scrutiny, including allowing residents to express their concerns.

Even without the public review process, some residents have not been shy with voicing their disapproval of the planned Hustler Hollywood store – including the editors of the Advocates for Arden-Arcade website, which published a scathing commentary in early December.

“Get ready, Arden Way, here comes yet another ‘something is better than nothing’ business to, you know, add value to our community’s growing array of fine commercial enterprises like X-rated massage parlors, usury lenders, bong shops, liquor stores, hookah bars and other similar businesses that you will not ever find in the neighborhood of a member of the Board of Supervisors,” the post begins. “That’s right… just down the street from the Kiss N Tell risqué lingerie shop there will soon be a Hustler Hollywood, porn king Larry Flint’s (sic) ‘upscale’ adult sex gear shop… Gee, thanks, so much, Sacramento County and your world-class business development team. Does anyone out there think Susan Peters will be at the ribbon cutting?”

County Supervisor Susan Peters, referenced above, was also called out by Seaman in his comments to the Bee. [Another Editor’s Note: Is it just me, or does it seem likely Seaman wrote the website post, or has co-opted all its rhetoric, at least?]

“You wouldn’t see this two blocks from Susan Peters’ house,” Seaman said of the Hustler store. “This wouldn’t go in a community where Susan Peters returns their phone calls.”

In a statement emailed to the Sacramento Bee, Peters responded that she’s done all she can, under the law at least, to stop businesses like Hustler Hollywood from opening shop in the area.

“As a resident of the Arden Arcade area, I am disappointed about this store planning to open on Arden Way,” Peters wrote. “It is unfortunate that adult related businesses have learned to work around the legal restrictions and thresholds in place by designing their stores to the extent permitted by law to operate.”

Here’s the thing, though; if the law stipulates a business which dedicates less than 25% of its display space to adult novelties is not an “adult novelty” store, how can Hustler Hollywood be accused of ‘working around’ the law? Isn’t it simply working within the law?

As noted by Howard Schmidt, Peters’ chief of staff, Peters has tried to do more to prevent adult businesses from operating in the area, but along the way, she ran up against this little bump in the legislative road commonly called “the Constitution.”

“Supervisor Peters has worked to place greater restrictions on adult entertainment businesses to the extent allowed by law and when doing so was told how court case law interpreting the First Amendment has hamstrung local government’s abilities to regulate,” Schmidt wrote in support of his boss. “While this store’s opening cannot be barred as a matter of law, I hope you can take some comfort in knowing that Code Enforcement will monitor to ensure the establishment complies with regulations so as not to expand into an unlawful adult entertainment business.”

In the meantime, if any Arden-Arcade residents would like to watch porn and/or shop for adult novelties to their heart’s content, without having to worry about possibly having navigate around angry, picketing neighbors, there’s always the internet.

The more things change…

Porno Shop image © Marco Togni