Most sex toys are made by responsible manufacturers. Some are marketed with pseudoscientific claims. Crystal dildos are a current trend that fit into that category.
The idea that crystals have healing and other powers has been around a long time. Usually what you wind up with is a chunk of cheap quartz which you pay a premium price for. It is just a rock. It has no magical powers other than the power to make a quick profit for the person selling it to you.
A company called Chakrubs claims that it is “the original crystal sex toy company.” I don’t know if that is true or not, but I will happily give them the blame. They sell a $70 Rhondonite Yoni Egg. We wrote about Yoni Eggs from crackpot “wellness” site Goop in Terrifying New Sex Products. That article explains why they should be avoided.
Chakrubs (the name combines the word rubbing with Chakras) also offers several crystal dildos. These work on the power of belief (placebo effect) and people’s gullibility. Here is one endorsement from the site: “Crystals are energy, as powerful as we are. I’m a meditator. My Chakrub has assisted me in reaching a higher awareness. It allows me a new form of meditation that everyone deserves to feel. Instead of racing to an orgasm, Chakrubs makes me present enough to want to slow down and enjoy the process.” I do not know if that is a real endorsement, and the person writing it may actually believe it, but mere belief does not make something true.
Claiming that crystals have as much energy as people is nonsensical. They are not energy, nor do they produce any measurable mysterious form of energy. Still, the owner of the company makes the traditional pseudo-science claims about her crystals. She claims the dildo made with rose quartz “dissolves the sorrows, worries, fears and resentments,” that the amethyst “works in the emotional, spiritual, and physical planes to provide calm, balance, patience, and peace,” and her highly hyped Chakrub Gaia Stone, “is a powerful aid to the process of raising the Kundalini,” the primal energy through which you can reach enlightenment. A “Gaia Stone” is green quartz produced from the Mount Saint Helens eruption, although much of what is sold is fake.
Then there is this endorsement “I immediately noticed the loving frequencies coming off it and I spend time just hanging out or sleeping with it.” This seems like the imaginings of someone who really needs to find a partner. Reading this one actually made me sad.
Here is part of another endorsement: “When that energy is connected with mine, the crystal literally pulsates and vibrates.” Quartz actually does have some amazing properties. It is a piezoelectric material, meaning that it produces and accumulates electric charge when subjected to mechanical stress. This piezoelectric effect is reversible, in that if you apply an electric charge the quartz will oscillate (think quartz crystal wristwatch). Quartz will not just oscillate on its own (even when combined with the weak electromagnetic field your body produces). Nor can you hook up a battery to your “crystal” dildo and turn it into a vibrator. You can hear the oscillation effect by running a finger around a quartz singing bowl. It will begin to oscillate and make sound. Of course, people also make claims that this sound is healing, because, why not?
Science shows that crystals do have some amazing properties, as in this recent article “A Better Way to Control Crystal Vibrations. They are not magical, nor has science ever been able to detect any healing powers of any sort. That claim has been tested.
Dr. Christopher French did a study in 2001 at Goldsmith’s College in London on the healing effects of crystals. He gave half of his participants real crystals and the other half fake crystals, and then gave them booklets explaining the sensations they might experience from the crystals. Of the 80 participants in the study, only six claimed to not experience a sensation. The rest, whether they held a real or a fake crystal, reported things like feeling warmer in certain areas or having increased concentration. According to French, “The fact that the same effects were found with both genuine and fake crystals undermines any claims that crystals have the mysterious powers which they are claimed to have.”
There are endless other nonsensical claims made about crystal dildos. One of them is that they can help cure past sexual trauma. No, they can’t. Sure, you might feel better after an orgasm, but sexual trauma needs to be dealt with working with a therapist. Therapy is the opposite of an orgasm should be- typically painful and difficult. It does offer much better long-term healing than a rock in your vagina, though.
Despite these dildos being hokum, I found tons of articles on them, few of which were actually brazen enough to call them out for what they are. There were headlines such as Healing Crystal Dildos Are Here to Make Your Vagina a Magical Place (Popsugar), and I Found Inner Peace with a Healing Crystal Dildo (Vice).
The Chakrubs dildos are quite beautiful and have a lot of aesthetic value. Sure, you are paring a “woo” tax, but there is not denying their attractiveness. As far as dildos go, though, you will get the same feel as you will get from a much cheaper Borosilicate Glass dildo. If you like hard dildos, I doubt you would be able to tell the difference between the two materials.
The big question is whether they are safe to use or not (Yoni Eggs are definitely not). Even the somewhat skeptical article in Women’s Health skirted around this issue, mentioning the issues of bacterial vaginosis and toxic shock syndrome (an issue caused by bacterial toxins adhering to porous materials, which is exacerbated by keeping things in your vagina for too long, as is recommended to do with Yoni Eggs). Many of the articles, including the one in Women’s Health, suggest checking with your gynecologist before using them. Gynogologists, not surprisingly, might or might not know the answer.
We know that Jade is porous. How porous is quartz? Not very, in general. A properly made quartz toys should, in theory, be just as safe as a glass toy.
Jade rates a 6 on the Mohs’ scale of mineral hardness. Quartz rates a 7 on the scale, which is fairly hard and around the hardness of glass. You want hardness and for it to be difficult to scratch, as scratches can harbor bacteria.
As with magnet based sex toys that we wrote about in Can Magnets Improve Your Love Life?, the miraculous effectiveness of crystal dildos is more dependent on belief than anything that is measurable scientifically. You are allowed to believe whatever you wish, but to me, selling products based on unverifiable claims is more fraud than commerce.