SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, TX — Note to adult business owners: Yep, Texas continues to be governed by a bunch of prudes.Online sex-toy store Vibrator.com got that message loud and clear when Cameron County officials grounded a plane towing a sky banner advertising the company’s website. The pilot had been hired to fly the banner above South Padre Island, a Mecca for spring breakers. Every year for a few weeks during March and April, high school and college students nationwide descend upon the small island town — which relies exclusively upon tourism for its survival — to drink, party and occasionally have sex on the beach.
But evidently, they aren’t supposed to be encouraged to use sex toys to enhance their encounters or prevent disease.
“People with sex toys can technically practice abstinence with sex toys,” said Vibrator.com spokesman Keith Levenson. “People have a physical need. It may be better in certain ways.”
Vibrator.com is based in New York City, where evidently banners bearing women’s silhouettes, suggestive URLs and the words “Got toys?” don’t raise many eyebrows. According to published reports, they actually may not raise many eyebrows in South Texas, either, even though part of Spring Break overlapped with Semana Santa, or Holy Week, this year.
“I only got one phone call and an e-mail from someone upset about the banner,” Cameron County Judge Carlos Cascos told The Monitor, a newspaper in nearby McAllen, TX, adding that the phone call was from a vacationing family and the email was thoroughly incomprehensible. Neither communication came from a church or indicated it was religiously motivated.
“But that’s not to say there weren’t a lot more people out there who were offended and did not know who to call or what to do about it,” Cascos hastened to add. “At first I didn’t know what the problem was, but when I saw the picture, I found it offensive.”
Cascos said the county cannot regulate what happens in the sky above it, but it can control what flies out of its airport. Cameron County has an aerial banner contract with the company that flew the banner, but there is no language in the contract to specify what types of advertising materials are appropriate. County officials are working to correct that, County Administrator Pete Sepulveda said.
Technically, the Federal Aviation Administration controls the skies over South Padre Island and every other city in the U.S., but an FAA spokesman said the First Amendment prevents his agency from becoming involved in questions of decency surrounding airborne advertising. In fact, about five years ago when a group of ministers protested a Hooters banner being flown above a football game in Dallas, the FAA declined to intervene on their behalf.
The Vibrator.com banner has flown over New York City and Miami, FL, without complaint, according to The Monitor.
