ANNAPOLIS, MD — LeRoy E. Myers, Jr. (R-Washington) is a Maryland General Assembly member who thinks about the children. Lately, he’s been worrying about the possible trauma experienced by youths when they see plastic body parts, specifically the more naughty ones.”It’s time to take a stand,” Myers told The Hagerstown Herald-Mail, explaining the motivation behind his decision to introduce a controversial new bill.
The measure, filed Monday in the state’s General Assembly, would protect minor youth from seeing fake bull testicles or other anatomically precise recreations attached to pickup truck trailer hitches. This would include, but not necessarily be limited to plastic animal gonads, human breasts, buttocks, or genitals.
Violators of the law would face a fine of as much as $500.
The Associated Press quotes Pamela Campbell, a Bullhead, AZ woman who sells fake bull testicles professionally, thinks Myers and those equally squeamish are looking at this the wrong way. In her opinion, the sight of a pair of reproduction bull testicles can lead to a valuable discussion of anatomy and reproduction. She also wonders how far such legislation might eventually be expanded. “De we have to neuter all dogs that walk by us?” she asked.
The American Civil Liberties Union is none-too-pleased, either.
“The legislation is overly broad,” Maryland ACLU representative Meredith Curtis opined in an email, “and would probably make it illegal to have a sticker on your car of the Venus de Milo from an art museum.”
Whether Myers’ attempt to clean up the highways and byways of Maryland will fare any better than Arizona’s failed effort to ban naked lady silhouette mud flaps is yet to be seen.
