"In January 1981, Milwaukee police arrested her for simulating sex on stage. Also charged with battery to an officer and obscene conduct, she was later cleared. Later that same year in Cleveland, Ohio, Williams was acquitted of an obscenity charge for simulating sex on stage wearing only shaving cream (she subsequently covered her nipples with electrical tape to avoid arrest).Then, in November, an Illinois judge sentenced her to one year supervision and fined her $35 for roughing up a freelance photographer who had attempted to take her picture as she jogged along the Chicago lakefront.

Meanwhile, the Plasmatics toured the world, having a concert in London cancelled on safety grounds, where the press dubbed them "anarchists." During shooting of an appearance on NBC's SCTV comedy program in 1981, studio heads said they would not air Williams unless she changed out of a stage costume that revealed her nipples. Williams refused. The show's make-up artists found a compromise and painted her breasts black."