We recently reported on CA’s new SB1215 bill, supposedly enacted to decrease battery fires and injuries to sanitation workers by ensuring that the ‘embedded batteries’ in certain products will be collected by recycling. The hope here is to stop the embedded batteries from being dumped in a city’s waste stream.

The new bill also saddles consumers of products that contain these embedded batteries with a covered electronic waste recycling fee upon the purchase of “a new or refurbished covered battery-embedded product.” Retailers selling products containing these batteries—certain medical devices, existing covered electronic devices (video display devices), certain energy storage systems, electronic nicotine delivery systems, and surely some sex toys—must also “collect the covered electronic waste recycling fee from the consumer and remit it to the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA).”

So, what does this all mean for us working our powered dildos to death?

The Industry Weighs In

While Brian Sloan, CEO of Autoblow feels “It’s too fresh to have an opinion on this,” he likens California going the way of the EU in making it very hard for small or even medium-sized businesses to operate. “Regulations like this,” Mr. Sloan further states, “will further place smaller companies at a disadvantage, and the effect on the environment will be negligible.”

In a perfect world, regulations exist to protect us all. But Mr. Sloan is right when he says we need to be cautious of yet another seeming government infiltration into sane (and potentially profitable) business via yet another law. And, as retailers, manufacturers, and purchasers of adult novelties know, sex toys—be it buying, selling, and owning them—are consistently under strict government considerations.

“Our customers love rechargeable toys because they’re better for the environment—but now they’re being told to treat them like e-waste, without guidance or sensitivity,” Tami Rose, owner of the Romantic Adventures adult retailer, says.

“Pleasure is personal,” she continues. “And if we want real sustainability in the sex toy industry, we need solutions that center not just the planet, but people’s dignity and autonomy, too.”

The aforementioned ‘government considerations’ seem to land on sex toy retailers, porn scene creators, and anyone making adult products or content, in a multitude of ways. The much-debated age verification laws enacted, enforced, and growing ever more restrictive are couched under a campaign of keeping children from pornographic material. Sex toy safety standards have been enacted and changed over the years to keep up with new and better (safer) materials. Technological safeguards are supposedly put into place to maintain user anonymity. But with the good of all this comes overreach, stifling, and quite often the wholesale depletion of some sure sex positive changes brought about by innovators.

Still, we do need to have power…