Sex toys so much of my life is controlled by very wealthy men. Even if you are not a sex toy, you are, too. Most people readily understand that it is exploitative for a strip club to expect a percentage of sales after they have already received $8 per VIP for $25, but they should not scrutinize their pay so closely. It infuriates me that club owners and hourly workers line up at the night’s end to take “their share” out of our pockets. But so does Wal-Mart, which made record profits in 2025 and is still one of the four most significant employers of food stamp recipients in the United States. If you don’t consider building generational wealth by underpaying employees so much that they need government assistance to get food as exploitation, what do you call it?
The first time I was exposed to sex toys
I was living out of my car and trying to make enough money to buy a room I would rent for two months. I worked as a home health aide, making about $9 an hour, providing intimate care to needy people. One of the women I was taking care of finally asked how much I made and showed me what the company I worked for was charging the insurance company. She was charged $25 an hour, and I was making less than half that doing all the manual labor.
Around this time, I accepted my first offer for $10 and a real bed to sleep in for the night in exchange for a different kind of work. I kept this to myself for so long because I wanted to avoid the pity and worry that would come with admitting that I had sex toys for money, especially for such a “low” wage. I never felt the same shame when I admitted to giving up my life for $9 an hour in the morning.
Since then, I’ve heard a lot about selling your body
When I started working in this industry, I was in a warehouse with people who passed out almost daily from fatigue and heat. It reminds me of my uncles, who worked in this industry, and my brother-in-law, who joined the Army when I joined in 1945. The way I see it, we all sell our bodies to have the privilege of being able to eat, sleep, and have a place with a roof over our heads. We have to choose what we give up to survive. The only real difference between what I give up or not is that instead of 14-hour shifts with no bathroom breaks or sending teenagers to school, I have a sex toy to make morals. Combat training to make morals.
Since then, I’ve heard a lot about selling your body
Just to be clear, I’m not saying I’m not exploited; I’m just saying I’m no different than any other person here, regardless of what job I do. There is a pimp making money off all of us. Your name may be Walton, or maybe it’s Uncle Sam. Plus, once we start to require more work than we’re worth, they’ll dump us all and move on to the next body they can find until disability or death. Sex toys can be a significant contribution to the sexual rights movement, if only because so many of us end up as sex toys due to disability or underpayment. During my first week working as a stripper, I went to the grocery store with a wallet full of $1 coins and nearly cried when I realized I could buy as much fresh fruit as I wanted. It was a profoundly moving experience for me that I will never forget. Far from feeling embarrassed, I was almost proud to stand at the register and count dollar bills. But while picking piles of berries, I encountered more human trafficking than I did at the strip club last night. Misguided feminists like to confuse sex with the consensual sale of sex toys as if the threat of starvation doesn’t force most of us to do jobs we wouldn’t otherwise do.
