Dildoes Up! -- The Return of Ranty Rooney

Aren't you glad you use a dildo? Don't you wish everyone did? I'm not making this up. It could happen. No one really talks about dildo politics, do they? But we know it's there, hovering on the brink of coming out. Think of it. It might happen this May -- which as you should know is Masturbation Month. Think of it -- a million women marching in Washington, D.C., then standing solemnly on Pennsylvania Avenue, holding up their whirring artificial dicks. It's got to be more impressive than the old light your lighter thing, flicking your Bic. That's so used. It's a scary image -- a Million Dildo March -- unless you're loaded with stock in battery companies. Downright spooky. Which is probably what politics is all about.

I have come to praise dildoes, not to bury them. That's what Marc Antony might have said. I'm no Marc Antony -- I'd say something like: "Dildoes up!" Wouldn't you? I think a Masturbation Month is great idea. It'll show those guys in Washington, Berlin, and other metropolitan cities that women are not just a bunch of jerkoffs. They have clout. And they're not afraid to let their dildoes do the talking. It would certainly be the most erotic buzz the capitols have ever felt.

They have every kind of vibrator and dildo you can imagine now, did you know? Realistic ones, glass ones, abstract ones. And yet they all operate in harmony. We humans could take a lesson from that, couldn't we?

The dildo as a political tool, a social symbol, a rallying emblem, is a pretty good one, really. It speaks of independence, doesn't it? Liberty. Freedom. I'm not saying The Founding Fathers were dickheads, but they must have had dildoes in mind too when framing the rights that were guaranteed everyone. Freedom of expression -- even if it comes on the point of a dildo -- is part of being human. And freedom to give yourself pleasure ought to be included in that "Pursuit of Happiness" line in the documents of Liberty, don't you think?

I don't know how the politicos would react to a Million Dildo March, but I'd like to see it. I mean, there's nothing threatening or shocking in an oblong piece of rubber, plastic, or realistic skin, whether it buzzes or just stands there quietly, is there? But it would make a statement of sorts if a million women would hold theirs up at the same time. And it doesn't have to just be in America. It could be an international event. There'd be the network and CNN reporters down among all those dildo-carrying women. They'd probably be afraid. Can you imagine, say, Dan Rather, or Wolf Blitzer carefully edging through the crowd, trying not to actually touch a buzzing dildo with any part of their body? I mean, they'd know where those dildoes have been, wouldn't they? But they couldn't admit that on camera. The expressions on their faces when they'd spot an obviously well-used dildo would be a scream. You know the kind I mean, a dildo, say, that had much of the covering a bit scraped off, maybe a few dents, or that tired, wheezy buzz of a vibrator that's given its all in service to a proud and smiling owner.

Maybe they'd even drag Walter Cronkite out of retirement for such an event, just so he could turn a vibrating dildo on and say "That's the way it is." one last time. Barbara Walters should make an appearance -- that goes without saying. Barbara could buzz for a moment or two as The Million and One-th Woman. I guess the toughest assignments, of course, in covering the Million Dildo March would be the in-depth reports. How could any reporter even say that with a straight face?

"This is Harry Reasoner with an in-depth report on The Rising Power of The Dildo." It even sounds funny. But in our Land of Liberty, something, clearly, needs to be done. Mayor Giuliani is crusading against adult book stores in New York City that sell masturbation material. And the United States has a President who was Governor of Texas, one of six other states that restrict the sale and distribution of sex toys. What's that about? Are they still tied hand-and-foot to the "knee-jerkoff" reactions of old liners who denied anyone gave themselves sexual pleasure? Or wanted them in jail if they did?

I don't understand being afraid of masturbation. I can't imagine a modern mother telling her twenty-something daughter "Don't do that! You'll grow plastic on the palm of your hand and go blind!" Masturbation with some form of dildo probably began back in the dim recesses of prehistory. We know the Ancient Greek and Roman women and Mesopotamian and Egyptian women used them. And the vibrating kind pre-date electricity. I've seen historical models that use a hand-crank! So what's the big deal? It's time we grew out of that "plain brown wrapper" need and are able to proudly proclaim "Hey, I bought a new dildo. Check it out!"

I say, Power to the Fake Penis, sister! Join the Million Dildo March and take yours to the big city and hold it up. Use it proudly during Masturbation Month. And if you set a record, send that naughty little toy to the Smithsonian Institute for future generations to gawk at and marvel over. "Look! It's just like Grandma's!" As Martha Stewart (don't you bet she has a handmade lace cozy cover for hers?) might say "It's a good thing, baby."

A Brief History of the Dildo

Historians don't know who invented the dildo but prehistoric humans carved phallic batons similar in size to modern dildos; their size, shape and explicit carvings clearly call for a sexual interpretation. A double baton, for example, from the Gorge d'Enfer region in France dating back to the Upper Paleolithic era consists of two carved penises set at the same angle you'd find in today's double dildos. Many archaeologists, even today, avoid the sexual interpretations, however, referring to the batons as ritual objects and "arrow-" or "spear-straighteners." Yet inserting objects vaginally and anally for sexual pleasure seems to be part of our evolutionary and cultural history; Greek pottery from the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. is widely recognized as illustrating graphic depictions of dildo use. Some examples of the prehistoric batons have handles, and the double baton could conceivably have been used by two women, with the hole used for some sort of strap.

The popularity of the dildo is considered to be related to the ancient Greek port city, Miletus. Miletan traders sold olisbos ('slippers') around the Mediterranean. Today's dildos are often enjoyed by couples, but in ancient Greece, they were sexual refuges for lonely ladies.

Herodias, a Greek poet of the 3rd Century, B.C. writes in his humorous sketch, The Dildo, about two famous women poets talking about their olisbos, but referring to it by the slang term, 'pacifier' (baubon, from baubao, 'sleep'),

Metro: Don't hold back, dear Koritto, who was the man that made the red Pacifier for you?

Koritto: Metro -- you haven't seen it have you?

Metro: Nossis, Erinna's daughter, had it a couple of days ago. Nice gift.

Koritto: Nossis? Where'd she get it?

Metro: Will you tell on me if I tell you?

Koritto: By your sweet eyes, dear Metro, nothing you say will be heard escaping from Koritto's mouth.

Metro: Bitas' wife Euboule gave it to her and told her no one should find out about it.

Koritto: Women. That woman will wear me out. She begged me and I took pity on her and gave it to her, Metro, before I could even get to use it myself. And she snatches it away like some hidden treasure and gives it to people who shouldn't get it. A fond farewell to friends like that. She can look for somebody else instead of me to lend my things to Nossis...If I had a thousand, I wouldn't give her one, not even a rotten one.

Metro: No, Koritto, don't let anger flare in your nostrils, when you hear of some silly story...But what I particularly wanted to find out from you, who made it for you? If you love me, tell me. Why are you looking at me and laughing?...Please, Koritto, don't hold back, and tell me who made it.

Koritto: Oh, why plead with me? Kerdon made it.

Metro: Who? Tell me! Kerdon?

Koritto: He is -- I don't know, either from Chios or Erythrae, bald, a little man...He works at home and sells undercover-every door these days fears the tax collectors. But his workmanship -- what workmanship. You'd think Athena's hands, not Kerdon's went into it. He came bringing two of them, Metro. When I saw them, my eyes swam at the sight-men don't have such firm pricks! Not only that, but its smoothness is sleep, and its straps are like wool, not leather. You couldn't find a kinder woman's shoemaker.

Centuries later, in Renaissance Italy, olisbo became "dildo" probably from the Italian diletto, to delight. Compared with today's lifelike models, most early dildos were crude affairs. Made of wood or leather, they required lots of lubrication of olive oil for comfortable use. Modern rubber dildos did not appear until the mid-19th century.

Dildos have always had an obvious sexual history, but vibrators have been hidden under "massage therapy." The first vibrators were developed 130 years ago to treat a dubious mental illness called "female hysteria." Hysteria, from the Greek for "suffering uterus," involved anxiety, irritability, sexual fantasies, "pelvic heaviness," and "excessive" vaginal lubrication -- in other words, sexual arousal during the Victorian era, when women were not considered sexual beings. Physicians treated hysteria by massaging their patients' clitoris until they experienced relief through "paroxysm" (orgasm). During the 1860s, health spas offered higher-tech alternatives to manual therapy, water jets and steam-powered vibrating devices.

The first electric vibrators appeared late in the 19th century, still camouflaged as therapy for hysteria and sold only to doctors. But as the years passed, magazine advertisements began offering vibrators to women for self-treatment of hysteria at home. In 1918, Sears Roebuck touted one vibrator as a "very satisfactory...aid every woman appreciates." Advertisements 1920s magazines urged men to buy the devices for their wives to keep them "young and pretty" and free from the scourge of hysteria.

Also during the 1920s, early pornographic movies began showing women using vibrators for sexual stimulation. The Roaring 20s, in the era of the "flapper girls," stripped vibrators of their social camouflage through porn, but by the repressive 1930s, they were no longer openly advertised. You've come a long, hard way, baby.