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Shopping Advice 
Sex and Disability
Wednesday, May 28th, 2008
Assumptions. We make them every day about almost everyone we see. Our brains are wired to work that way and a lot of the time it helps us. For instance, we can assume that when we see a chair, we can sit in it and it will hold us up. It saves us a lot of time not to have to figure that out every time we need to sit down. However, other kinds of assumptions can be very damaging, especially those around sexuality. At Babeland, I feel constantly challenged not to make assumptions about the people I help or the questions they ask. Sometimes it’s hard but I’m always reminded of how important it is when the fact that I didn’t make an assumption helps someone get the toys or information they need.
Assumptions about sexuality can take a lot of different forms, from assuming someone’s gender or gender preferences to assuming their level of experience or the kind of pleasure they want to have. It can even mean assuming that they have no desire whatsoever to even be sexual. This is an assumption that a lot of people with disabilities encounter. Our culture does not think of people with visible physical or mental disabilities as people with sexuality or as people that others would be attracted to.
In fact, sexuality is an important component of everyone’s lives and manifests itself in many different ways. Discussing sex and disability raises some very interesting and important questions. For instance, if two less able people want to engage in sexual activity but cannot position themselves where they want to be, is it ok for a third person to help them? What if that person engages in some sexual activity? What if someone is cognitively impaired? How does a partner of that person make sure there’s consent?
Dan Savage of Savage Love tackles some of these issues this week in a column that I was so happy to see in print. Dan and Cory Silverberg from About.com (and the author of the Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability) answer disability-related questions in an open an informative way. It’s worth reading for everyone - even if there is no one in your life who is disabled.
Babeland is having an inservice on this topic for our employees later in June so I’ll be back to report on what I learned. I’m excited to get more information so that I can continue to provide the best possible customer service to our customers, no matter what their ability levels are.
There are a lot of different sex toy materials out there and most of them generate little to no reactions when people hear about them. Glass is another story. Usually even a mention of glass toys makes people cringe and ask “isn’t it going to break?” I feel as if I can see inside their heads for that moment as they imagine themselves using a toy, only to have it break like a cheap wine glass inside of them.
Glass has some special characteristics that make it worth using: the weight of glass feels different internally than a hard plastic or a silicone sex toy. The smoothness of the surface is number one (along with stainless steel), add a little bit of 