By Peter Berton

CHICAGO – Sex toys have gone mainstream in a big way. The website of venerable department store Sears now carries vibrators, strap-ons, male masturbation devices and fetish gear.

Yep. Adult toys right there next to the garden-variety power tools.

Among the items offered at Sears.com are Nasstoys Orgasmalicious Sweet Delite vibrator. The product description promises the “pulsating sex toy will add excitement to intimate relationships.” Sadly, the only image presented is a placeholder advising “Mature Content.”

Clicking the placeholder takes one to an explanation: “Warning: This product’s packaging may contain graphic sexual images inappropriate for minors. All items ship in a discreet outer box.” Ooh — how naughty!

Interestingly, other product images appear in all their glory. Take Pipedream’s Fetish Fantasy Vibrating Strap-on Liner, for example. The description reads, “Tucked away discreetly behind this strap-on harness is a perfectly placed silicone clitoral massager designed to rock your world…. Go from a flutter to a throb with the push of a button and find a rhythm that’s right for you.”

Typing “sex toy” into the website’s built-in search function produced a list of more than 500 California Exotics products, 197 from Doc Johnson, 152 from Pipedream and 102 from Topco. Along with the links, Sears.com offered this helpful suggestion: “You are currently viewing ‘vibrator’ in Health & Wellness. We also found ‘vibrator’ in the following departments: Automotive, Tools, TVs & Electronics, All Departments.”

Automotive? Thanks, but I’ll pass.

Following the link to the Sexual Wellness category brought up more products than we’ve seen anywhere except pn the biggest adult novelty warehouse websites. Sears.com offers No Xzen 1200 Sexual Enhancer For Men, Ozze Inc. Sexual Fantasy Vouchers, California Exotic Novelties’ Vibrating Big Man’s Pump and DIY Pocket Pal Pink Pussy-style Male Masturbator, and Nasstoys’ Naughty Neiko Doll – and those are just the appetizers.

Searching for “BDSM” brings up a list of books including How to Be Kinky, Mistress/slave BDSM Contract and Dramatic Weight Loss Using BDSM in addition to products including Strict Leather’s Padded BDSM Blindfold, Kinklab’s Vampire Gloves and Master Series Warming and Aftercare BDSM Spanking Spray.

To be fair, Sears may be using a drop-shipper rather than stocking the items itself. We certainly haven’t seen any titillating evidence on the shelves at Sears’ brick-and-mortar stores. What a delightfully subversive way to throw nosy neighbors off the trail of unwanted gossip, though: “It’s just another package from Sears, Maude. Nothing unwholesome there.”

But…. Seriously, Sears — the same company that once sold mail-order cabins to God-fearing pioneers on America’s western frontier — sells sex toys online? Right in front of God and anybody else who wants to look, too. Where is the conservative outrage? Where is the right-wing boycott?

Where is my wallet?