MANATEE COUNTY, FL — For some, pornography is like art; difficult to define until one sees it. A Bradenton joke shop is bristling in response to having some of its stock deemed not so much artful as, apparently, pornographic.Visitors to C & J’s Joke Shop will find a wide variety of items to choose from, ranging from the classic whoopee cushion to comedy classics including Gilligan’s Island. Those who can’t wait to watch their favorite Three Stooges film or animated short can get their ha-ha’s off in private viewing booths — as can customers with a taste for something a wee bit spicier.

Because the shop includes adult videos and sex toys among its inventory of saleable items, some contend that it falls under the two year old Manatee County sexually oriented business ordinance, which requires a special license not only for its own existence but for the employment of each individual on its payroll. Additionally, the ordinance gets to tell business owners how to lay out their displays, how to light their interiors, and what hours they’re allowed to be open. Additionally, before being allowed to work at adult business establishments, each employee must undergo and pass a criminal background check. Usually businesses like adult video or book stores, strip clubs, and lingerie modeling salons fall under the ordinances power, but any business that contains a “substantial portion” of adult-themed stock — a minimum of 35-percent — qualifies.

Currently about a dozen establishments are considered covered by the ordinance, yet only two have actually complied. C & J’s hopes to gain an exclusion from the regulations and is calling the battle a First Amendment fight against sexual censorship.

At least one attorney for the embattled joke shop articulate the thoughts of many adult business owners when Tampa legal advisor Noel Flasterstein asked “What do I care if Bob the banker stops by and watches a video and goes home? Maybe his wife does, but the government is going to have to come up with more than just a loathsome distaste for it.”

County regulators will likely be unmoved by such arguments, however, given that the mere presence of viewing booths means C & J’s Joke Shops qualifies as a sexually oriented business. The fact the amount of adult merchandise carried by the store is considered “substantial” just makes the issue more of a non-issue, as far as they’re concerned. “In my estimation, there are certainly things in the store that appear to trip the ordinance,” county director of community services Fred Loveland explains.

C & J’s has taken down at least 10-percent of its sexier inventory in order to fall below the minimum qualifying total, but even as a regular novelty shop, the existence of its profitable viewing booths presents a legal problem that could require the owners to boost lighting and make every inch of the shop visible from the cash register.

The new ordinance is a result of its over-broad predecessor being declared invalid for having defined nudity too expansively. Additionally, but hardly surprising to open-minded industry observers, the county had been unable to prove that adult businesses resulted in an increase in criminal activity. In April 2005 the new laws took effect and the Peek-a-Boo Lounge, Paper Moon, and Cleopatra’s (now Pandora’s Box) took Manatee County to federal court to fight a six-foot distance rule and prohibition of alcohol. The clubs are not required to comply with the regulations until their case has been decided. C & J’s remains open using a provisional license and about half a dozen other adult-themed businesses are under compliance investigation.