Transgender Sex Shop Exec Reportedly Labeled 'Conservative' in San Francisco Race

A transgender woman who used to run a sex toy company called Good Vibrations reportedly is being labeled as the "conservative" candidate in a local San Francisco race.

SF Weekly reports that Theresa Sparks, a candidate for a seat on the city's Board of Supervisors, is being criticized as the insider, conservative pick.

Sparks is backed by Mayor Gavin Newsom and held a seat on the city's Police Commission. She allegedly drifts "conservative" by opposing a hotel tax and, according to one local paper, declining to put pressure on the city's police officers while serving on the disciplinary panel.

But Sparks dismissed that label in an interview with SF Weekly.

"This points to how people in this city love to construe and redefine the term 'progressive,'" she said.

According to Sparks' personal website, she was born a man but eventually changed her appearance to look like a woman after two marriages -- to women -- ended in divorce.

"It's hard to conceive of any other American city in which a candidate with Sparks' background would be portrayed as an insider in favor of protecting the status quo," SF Weekly wrote.