Roll up, roll up, it’s 2022 and sexual liberation is here. Or at least, a watered-down version of it. 

Female sexuality continues to have its moment. We have campaigns encouraging women and femmes to talk about wanking. There are ads for vibrators and posters for Viagra on the Tube. You can probably take an online quiz to find out which high end sex toy you’re most like based on your favourite Netflix show — though it’s unlikely to end up suggesting a toy that actually works for you. 

But are we only OK with talking about 'female pleasure' because we can sell cis women cute vibrators? The short answer is yes. Sex toy sales soared during lockdown, and in the last 12 months a number of celebrities — including Lily Allen, Cara Delevingne, Demi Levato — have endorsed or released their own sex toys. There’s never been more permission and encouragement for self-exploration and self-pleasure, but in the eyes of sex educators like Ruby Rare, author of Sex Ed: A Guide for Adults, these strides forward in sexual liberation are driven by capitalism. 

For evidence of this, Rare points to the difference in how we treat sex toys designed for cis women and cis men. While vibrators for women — well, for white, straight, thin, abled, cis women — are marketed as ‘essentials’ and promoted as empowering, sex toys for cis men still carry the same stigma. It's a different social shame from that of a cis woman having a one night stand, but equally as pervasive. 

Not all sex toy marketing is created equal

Men owning sex toys still comes with a perceived 'seedy' stigma. Sex toys marketed towards cis men aren't considered a fun addition to partnered or solo sex, as sex educator and sex toy reviewer Kelvin Sparks says, "Men are less shamed for having sex and more shamed for not having sex than women are, and sex toys are often treated as evidence somebody isn't having partnered sex." ​​Nor have we moved past the idea that using butt plugs or exploring anal play makes a man 'gay' — even though sex acts have nothing to do with sexual identity. Sparks also argues that 'feminist' sex shops are often perceived as more ‘middle class’ and thus more acceptable than the 'sleazy' sex shops aimed at predominantly male customers.

All of this taboo around sex toys designed for men is much harder to shake, even with a smart marketing campaign. A cis man thrusting his penis into a toy shaped like a porn performer's mouth just isn't palatable in the way a photo of a cis woman caressing a carefully placed grapefruit with a purple vibrator is. It’s not that sex toys for people with penises aren’t profitable, or that there aren’t innovative designs being brought to the market, it’s that the stigma around them isn’t so easily purplewashed and sold to consumers as empowerment. 

It feels like the aim is just to sell sex toys successfully, rather than actually help people feel good about their bodies, so why not go for the easier — and cuter — marketing option?

The suggestive grapefruit is a recurring motif in sex toy marketing, because in an erotophobic society even the biggest companies need to work within the rules of what is ‘acceptable’. In order to get around the social taboo — and the strict nudity guidelines and censorship of sexual content on social media –- they have to get creative. But getting creative almost always means sanitising their brand and leaning into a ‘clean’, desexualised aesthetic.

A company taking this to the extreme is Maude, a sexual wellness company which reached an unprecedented $10 million in funding in 2021 — and saw actor Dakota Johnson joining the team as an investor and co-creative director in 2020. Maude insists that its products are not sex toys: they are instead referred to as "essentials" for sexual wellness. However, sex toy reviewer and blogger Epiphora tells me Maude is "creating the illusion of doing something meaningful" and not genuinely interested in empowering customers. If the company were, it might consider that not everyone uses sex toys (so they cannot be 'essentials') and not everyone uses them for 'wellness' — sometimes we’re just horny and want to get off! 

"Sex toys are toysfor sex," Epiphora says. "Removing the word 'sex' is not a destigmatising move, and don't even get me started on 'toy.' Maude is attempting to make their products palatable to a wider audience, and in doing so, they are choosing to disregard marginalised consumers." Choosing to avoid the word 'toy' does tend to impact the idea of pleasure and playfulness from sex, turning it into something serious — not something we might actually like. As Epiphora writes in her blog post about why we need to call sex toys exactly that: "They are meant for adding playfulness and fun to your sex life. In our sex-negative culture, where to even enjoy sex (especially as a woman) is somehow blasphemous, this is important."

Éva Goicochea, CEO and founder of Maude, says that the company's aim is to take sex — and the pleasure of people with vulvas – seriously in a world that often doesn’t do that.

"70 percent of women don’t orgasm during vaginal sex and so external stimulation is often needed," she says. "It's a very normal thing and I think that because as a society we’ve continued to call them toys it just feels like they’re these add-ons or novel items as opposed to necessary items."

Sexual empowerment or profits?

Increasingly, sex toys are sold not merely as items for sexual play, but as tools for sexual empowerment. Sex toys, we’re told, are how we reclaim our bodies from the patriarchy. They’re marketed to us as a way to own our sexuality, as well as showing how progressive and feminist we are. But with everyone captioning their new sex toys with #orgasmsareselfcare, we miss out on the bigger conversations around sexual liberation. We miss out on talking about consent, about bodily autonomy, about how sex can be messy, playful, and fun. A marketing campaign for a new 'sonic wave' toy might be based around 'self-love', but it’s simply not palatable to dig into reproductive justice. 

Basically, it’s not necessary when your goal is profit rather than sexual liberation. Despite companies claiming how feminist their toys are, how well are they really doing?

"Sex toy companies proudly tout being founded by women, when those women are almost always white, cis, straight, young, and able-bodied," Epiphora points out, "Is this something to celebrate anymore?" This ‘lean in’ feminism — based on Meta executive Sheryl Sandberg's thesis that women in positions of leadership can only be a good thing — doesn't have a tangible impact on just how pleasurable the sex toys end up being, or indeed the people they're designed to be used by. "It means more sleek boxes, less penis-centric designs, and hip marketing materials," Epiphora says.

Trendy marketing materials can still alienate people. 27-year-old Betty, who is in a long-term relationship, says that although she logically knows that sex toys are for everyone, the way they’re marketed makes her feel like they’re only for "sexy people doing sexy things" — a group she does not count herself among.

"Anytime I've tried to wear something 'sexy' I feel like a pile of lumpy mashed potato and it completely ruins everything and no one’s ever seeing me anywhere near naked again," she says.

It’s important to recognise that sex tech companies aren’t talking to all women. They routinely leave out people of colour, queer and trans people, disabled people, older people, fat people, and even non-monogamous people. You can see this in how often sex tech marketing focuses on how the toy will help cis women close the orgasm gap, which is ​​the term coined to describe the disparity in orgasms between cishet couples. It's an important issue, of course, but one that disproportionately  affects straight cis women. A 2017 study showed that straight cis women say they always orgasm during sex only 65 percent of the time — compared to 95 percent of straight cis men.

There’s no such thing as a universal sex toy

It’s not just celebrities endorsing sex toys either: it’s every influencer with a brand deal who’s just been given their first vibrator to shill. Deborah Frances-White and her guests on The Guilty Feminist— a feminist podcast with over 95 million downloads — rave about the Satisfyer Pro 2 on multiple episodes. Which would be fine, if they had at any moment reminded their audience that not every toy works for everyone. Instead, we get sweeping statements – "It’s a miracle!" – as though everyone is guaranteed mind-blowing orgasms with that particular toy. 

Whenever a product is presented as universal, the nuance of sexual desire disappears — and it’s the consumers who suffer. Astrid, who is 27 and bisexual, used to buy into the idea that in order to be a sexually empowered, feminist woman, she 'needed' to find a vibrator that worked for her. When she tried air-pulse technology toys AKA 'clit suckers,’ she found that they didn’t give her the mind-blowing orgasms she’d been promised.

"That made me feel weird, like everyone else had figured it out and I used it wrong," she says, "or maybe there was something off about me that I didn't love it as much as I thought I should."

Yet having celebrities endorse sex toys isrevolutionary. The sex positive steps we've taken forward to get to this point are so important. I turned eighteen in 2016: for nearly the entire time I’ve been able to buy sex toys, they’ve been available in cute pink boxes at Boots. It’s a hard-won privilege that vibrators are as easily purchased as condoms, and one I probably take for granted. (Though let it be noted that it’s easier to buy a vibrating cock ring than dental dams, because heterosexual, penis-in-vagina penetration is still front and centre.) 

The progress we’ve made in being able to openly talk about female pleasure is important and should be celebrated. Celebrities holding up sex toys and saying 'I use this, I wank too' changes the cultural narrative around sex toys and female pleasure. They’re helping mainstream culture start to have conversations that were only years ago considered incredibly taboo. Slowly, piece by piece, we’re chipping away at the shame that surrounds sex. Women are feeling more empowered to talk about sex and ask for what they want in the bedroom. 

Trying to make sex 'respectable'

Yet that empowerment, like the shame it's supposed to replace, still comes with strict rules for what is socially acceptable or celebrated. Rare points out that companies' prioritisation of cute, clitoral vibrators over dildos promotes a heteronormative view of sex that prizes the penis above everything else: nothing should be allowed to replace it. (Although clitoral stimulation is important: a 2017 study found that almost twice as many cis women can orgasm with clitoral stimulation during penetration than from penetrative sex alone.) The majority of sex toys marketed at cis women come in non-threatening colours — pink, purple, and sex-toy teal. There are many dildos in skin tones, but these are more often marketed towards queer men; the idea that a woman might want to fuck herself with something resembling an actual penis seems to be far less palatable. Or, possibly, far more queer.

Sex tech companies can’t get away from the fact that they’re selling sex toys — even though some try — but they can make the sex they’re selling us as ‘respectable’ as possible. And for bigger companies, that means ignoring the fact that their customers aren’t all white, straight, thin, abled cis women. It means ignoring just how queer using sex toys can make the sex you’re having. 

It means using the language of sexual liberation to sell sex toys when kickstarting these conversations is merely a side effect of what companies are trying to do. 

These conversations are important, but they’re only the first step. While women might feel more empowered to ask for what they want in bed, they’re still socially shamed out of it a lot of the time. While that is changing, Rare believes that in order to ensure profit, sex tech companies will need to keep the conversation as ‘clean’ as possible. Slut-shaming and sexual assault will be glossed over in favour of yet another 101-level discussion about pleasure.

Pleasure is a worthy goal, of course. "A vibrator can't convince you you're worthy of love," Epiphora says. She’s right. Sexual liberation driven by capitalism will never be truly empowering, despite all its feminist marketing. In a sex negative society, sanitising your brand and working with celebrities might get you trending on Twitter, but making sex toys more accessible doesn’t mean they’re more inclusive. In marketing sex toys as wellness items, we skip over the truth that sex can be fun— and playful and messy, though not always very sexy! 

And as brilliant as they are, orgasms are only one small part of sexual liberation. The sex tech industry may be able to thrive without digging underneath the sanitised version of sexual empowerment that they’re selling us, but we can’t.