While taking a break from my essay writing, a group of us ventured off to the mall. We made the rounds looking for a formal dress for Tama until she decided that she was just going to go buy some fabric and make a dress for herself. As she was down in Fabricland, a group of us stayed in Chapters to kill time. After making my rounds of the store Jess and I finally ended up in the sex section.
As I was reading a book about Kama Sutra and figuring out how I might do the half-supported congress (based on the nude and graphic pictures) a female employee of Chapters approached. She pretty well came up behind us and asked if we were eighteen or older. We said yes. And as I was feeling more brave than usual I asked her why it mattered. She said that some of the books in the sex section at Chapters are considered pornography and that legally they can't be looked at by, or sold to minors. I said I thought that was very strange and asked her why such a mainstream store like Chapters would sell porn. Her reply was that convenience stores sell porn. (I thought that was pretty lame.) I said that there was a difference because Chapters was mixing in books that they consider porn with educational books about sex and that teens and adults should be allowed to learn about sex. They really should be separating the "porn" from the learning material. By this point she realized that I wasn't being attack-ey and that I was just curious about this odd phenomenon. I asked her if kids were allowed in the Erotica section, and she said yes because there are no pictures. I told her I thought that made very little sense. We ended up having a good little chat about the sex taboo and how Chapters was taking baby steps towards breaking the taboo by offering that section.
The whole thing really made me wonder if this "no minors in the sex section" rule is enforced in every Chapters/Indigo location. I think I'll make it my new project to ask. Getting carded in the sex section was a little bit like getting caught with my pants down, it was totally unexpected. Who knew they had rules like that?