In his acclaimed 1989 book The Second World War, British historian John Keegan lamented how a certain word achieved an ugly notoriety during the 20th century’s greatest bloodbath: “how terrible a meaning did ‘special’ acquire during the Second World War—‘special leader,’ ‘special command,’ ‘special treatment’ all spelt death to the defenceless and disfavoured.”
A good deal less horrific—but far more hilarious—is the context surrounding the word “special” in the county Department of Liquor Control’s Bible, otherwise known as the “Rules Governing the Manufacture and Sale of Intoxicating Liquor of the County of Maui.” Specifically, Section 08-101-23 of the code, titled “Special Conditions.”
This is the part of the LC’s code that most famously requires dance clubs to keep booze out of their dance floor. But it also prohibits a lot of other activity that doesn’t so much involve liquor as it does, well, sex and hardcore nudity.
“Entertainers shall not expose to view any portion of the pubic hair, anus, cleft of the buttocks, vulva or genitals, or any portion of the female breast below the top of the areola,” states Paragraph (d). And such prohibitions aren’t limited to “entertainers”—Paragraph (l) prohibits similar exposure from “any person.”
Paragraph (f) goes even further. This one prohibits licensees from “permit[ting] any person” to engage in (either actually or through simulation) “Sexual intercourse, masturbation, sodomy, bestiality, oral copulation, or flagellation” as well as prohibiting “the touching, caressing or fondling of the breast, buttocks, anus or genitals.”
Most curiously, the code also prohibits liquor licensees from allowing, “any female impersonator to perform acts of or acts wherein such person displays any portion of the breast below the top of the areola.”
I’ve never personally witnessed such an activity, nor have I seen it in any of the LC Board of Adjudication minutes dating back to the late 1990s, but I have no doubt such an act would definitely be special.
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