Features
Sex and the Campus: Sex Toys
By Hannah O’Grady ’17
September 22, 2016
Tags features
Hi, it’s me again! For this week’s column, I’ve decided to touch upon sex toys/vibrators. For those of you who didn’t read the article from last week: I worked in a sex shop while I was abroad in Amsterdam this past spring and learned about and sold dozens of vibrators to a variety of excited customers.
Now I’m back in America, stuck here with all of this knowledge in my head, and I figured that I should share it. But first, I will start with a quick history lesson regarding the invention of the vibrator.
History
The original vibrator was not originally built for the pleasure of women, but rather, was built as a cure for hysteria. For those of you who don’t know, hysteria was a vaguely defined ‘disorder’ that women were commonly diagnosed with centuries ago. Back then, hysteria was seen to be caused by a variety of things, such as sexual frustration and even a wandering uterus. Doctors believed that bringing a woman to orgasm through clitoral stimulation would relieve her of this ‘ailment.’ After growing too tired of manually bringing women to orgasm, doctors in the mid -1800s created the first vibrator. This vibrator was actually a table with a strategically placed hole the woman would sit on. In this hole was a rotating sphere, powered by steam!
After this came the first electromechanical vibrator with a battery rumored to weigh over 40 pounds, still purely used for relieving hysteria. Eventually came the invention of smaller hand-held vibrators that women could use for self-pleasure in the comfort of their own home. With the help of porn, vibrators have become a less stigmatized toy throughout the years.
Types
Now that I’ve shared with you the history of the invention of the vibrator, I’ll get into the details of current types. I’d like to preface this by saying that vibrators come in all shapes and sizes, for any body type. However, I’ll just focus upon the ones most popularly sold and asked about in my store.
The Pocket Vibrators/Clitoral Vibrators
I always thought that these vibrators were the cutest. During my first day working at the store, I was confused as to why chapstick was being sold among the sex toys. It was then that my coworker informed me that they weren’t selling chapstick, but, rather, these were itty bitty vibrators for clitoral stimulation.
These vibrators were no longer than two inches, but had a lot of different vibration settings for exterior use. Furthermore, these vibrators were disguised as little tubes of lipstick and chapstick, in case someone wanted to be more discrete. Hey, you could even tuck one into your purse and no one would even know.
Rabbit Vibrators
These types of vibrators became even more famous after their appearance in Sex and the City. These vibrators are a little more intense. They consist of both a vibrating dildo and exterior ‘bunny ears’ (for clitoral stimulation) for double the pleasure! These come in all different sizes and vibration settings; in fact, some even have tips that oscillate. Furthermore, some of these rabbit vibrators have curved ends on the dildo portion, which results in a G-Spot stimulation as well.
The Hitachi Wand Vibrator
Fun fact: this device was originally created as a body massager to relieve tension in sore/tight muscles.
However, thanks to the sex positive movement of the 1960s, this device is now being used in new and more intimate ways. Used as a vibrator, this device is often applauded as the most powerful one created yet! Apparently, this magic wand is known to give anyone an orgasm, even women who were previously diagnosed with female sexual arousal disorders or inabilities to attain an orgasm.
In my opinion, this device looks somewhat like a wand but more like a large microphone. The top of this device is a silicone or rubberized ball that vibrates at different speeds and intensities, and it can be used for clitoral stimulation. However, this wand is rarely recommended to ‘beginners’ because the vibrations are apparently very intense.
Cock Rings
Sex toys shouldn’t be reserved for just some people. Rather, I’m a firm believer that there is a sex toy out there for every person and every body type. Cock rings are nice for all parties involved, and the name is pretty self-explanatory. These toys, similar to vibrators, also come in all shapes and sizes. Some cock rings vibrate, some don’t; it all depends on what you and your partner like.
Etc…
As stated, I have only touched upon a few sex toys out of many. Trust me; there is a toy for whatever desire or fetish you have. So go out there and look!