5 Countries Where Traveling With or Buying Sex Toys Is Illegal

Sex blogging comes with perks like jacking off for work, but downsides like travel limitations. The right to buy sex toys is one that I admittedly take for granted.

It’s not a minor priv­i­lege. Without dil­dos, I could­n’t effec­tive­ly mas­sage my cervix on my own, nor cul­ti­vate that bod­i­ly aware­ness for part­nered play. Without near-effortless Magic Wand orgasms, I’d have less reprieve from my depres­sive funks. My life would­n’t be near­ly as pleasurable.

The unfor­tu­nate truth, though, is that my job would­n’t be pos­si­ble in many parts of the world. Finding sex shops in Brisbane, London, and Montreal? No prob­lem. Phnom Penh? I’d have to find a black mar­ket dil­do deal­er. (My favorite line from the linked Vice arti­cle is, “I exam­ined an unnerv­ing­ly real­is­tic and veiny dil­do named, ‘American Boy Dong.’ ” Maybe it tastes like Pepsi Cola.) And get­ting past cus­toms would be a pain in the ass.

I could get away with hid­ing a mini-vibe in my make­up bag or sun­glass­es case. But my suit­case of insertable per­vert­ibles would more than like­ly be con­fis­cat­ed — or worse — get me fined, detained, or arrest­ed in the fol­low­ing countries.

The list is by no means com­pre­hen­sive. There are some places where there’s no law explic­it­ly about sex toy pos­ses­sion, but there is an anti-obscenity law. Or cul­tur­al con­ser­vatism and cus­toms offi­cers who would hound you. You get the idea.

UPDATE TO REITERATE: These laws have a lot more gray than this post ini­tial­ly sug­gest­ed. Bear in mind that enforce­ment gen­er­al­ly come down to cus­toms offi­cers’ inter­pre­ta­tions of what’s obscene, which could vary. So while sex toys might tech­ni­cal­ly be legal in some of these places, bring­ing a tee­ny clit vibe is fine, but a big real­is­tic dil­do is much more like­ly to offend some­one. Also, some sell­ers may bribe an offi­cer to turn a blind eye.

Vietnam

Attempts to bring sex toys into Vietnam can result in con­fis­ca­tion and fines of “a few mil­lion dong.” (Yep, that’s the name of the currency.)

And that’s too bad. It’s the coun­try of my ances­tors. It’s beau­ti­ful. You can stay at a five-star hotel for $50 a night. The food is deli­cious. And of all the coun­tries that Anthony Bourdain has been, Vietnam is one of his favorite places on earth. “My first love — a place I remain besot­ted with, fas­ci­nat­ed by.” I’d love to vis­it, but I would­n’t live there.

Thailand

You can drink on the streets, buy antibi­otics with­out a pre­scrip­tion, and pur­chase a woman’s “com­pan­ion­ship” with dispir­it­ing ease, but in Thailand, you can’t buy a sex toy — at least not legally.

—Teirra Kamolvattanavith for Coconuts.Co Bangkok

In Thailand, trade or dis­tri­b­u­tion of sex toys is pun­ish­able by up to three years in prison and six thou­sand baht. Anecdotally, you might not have any prob­lems if your gad­gets are non-representational, if you don’t bring many, and if they’re not pack­aged for sale.

Maldives

Upon hear­ing, “the Maldives,” you might imag­ine palm trees, white sand, and gor­geous turquoise beach­es. A top hon­ey­moon des­ti­na­tion. But think twice when pick­ing a cou­ples’ toy to bring with you.

Something non-cylindrical like the Hot Octopuss Digit or Dame Pom might be pass­able, but sex toys are spec­i­fied in the Maldives’ import laws. Your toy might get con­fis­cat­ed, and the author­i­ties might deny entry into the coun­try. Getting arrest­ed for sex toy pos­ses­sion there is also not unheard of.

United Arab Emirates

Along with the Maldives (and many oth­er Muslim-dominated coun­tries), the UAE also has anti-obscenity laws.

I’ve read con­flict­ing anec­dotes about what hap­pens if author­i­ties find sex toys in your bag. They might get con­fis­cat­ed, you might get fined 250 USD, and you might have to sign doc­u­ments in Arabic say­ing that you won’t try to bring sex toys into the coun­try again.

Mauritius

The Middle East and Southeast Asia aren’t the only regions of the world with anti-obscenity laws. Africa and Asia are tied, regard­ing the per­cent­age of coun­tries where sex toy imports are banned. Among them is Mauritius, yet anoth­er coun­try known for its gor­geous beach­es and reefs. (Ugh! There’s irony in get­ting wan­der­lust while research­ing trav­el des­ti­na­tions where my job could get me in trouble.)

In Mauritius, those with sex toys in their lug­gage risk up to one year in prison and 100,000 Mauritian Rupee.

Wrapping it up!

The words “might” and “could” recur in this post. Since “obscene” is sub­jec­tive, out­comes depend on the cus­toms offi­cers and whether they’re in a good mood. It’s not black-and-white; the con­ver­sa­tion about import laws, obscen­i­ty laws, and pri­va­cy rights around the world is ever-changing.

As a Midwest American, I’m priv­i­leged to have easy access to retail­ers that give fucks about con­sumer safe­ty and plea­sure. Informing the mass­es about the dan­gers of tox­ic sex toys is enough of a bat­tle in my coun­try. (I added “Midwest” because Texas and Alabama have anti-obscenity laws, too. Bummer.)

But in coun­tries where adult prod­ucts are on the black mar­ket, it’s far hard­er to find qual­i­ty and body-safe sex toys.

It’s not that I would­n’t vis­it any of the above coun­tries. If I did, I’d sched­ule blog con­tent before leav­ing the US. That would keep the blog posts com­ing, with­out stress over how many toys to bring. But I know I’d bring at least one. If an author­i­ty found a sil­i­cone pep­per in my bag, I could calm­ly claim that it’s a chew toy for a dog. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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My mom thinks I am a black mar­ket dil­do dealer.

— Super Smash Cache (@supersmashcache) November 18, 2019

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Photo credits

• Vietnam — Rashel Ochoa
• Thailand — Sara Dubler
• Maldives — Shifaaz Shamoon
• UAE — Reisuhu

All oth­er pho­tos in this post are mine.

Disclaimer

Hey! This post is spon­sored. Thanks for read­ing. As always, you can sup­port my work by buy­ing sex toys via my links or tip­ping me/buying me a coffee.