Japan finally banning child porn

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/asia-pacific/japan-to-ban-child-porn-after-years-as-international-outlier-1.1828786

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Thank God. As with so many other aspects of Japanese pornography and prostitution law, this originated as more a legal loophole than a conscious policy choice, but not fixing it until now has been downright inexcusable. 'An embarrassment' is right. I also don't think the anime and manga industries should be exempt, and I say this as an anime and manga fan.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Thank God. As with so many other aspects of Japanese pornography and prostitution law, this originated as more a legal loophole than a conscious policy choice, but not fixing it until now has been downright inexcusable. 'An embarrassment' is right. I also don't think the anime and manga industries should be exempt, and I say this as an anime and manga fan.

I read that earlier in the week and thought "that's f[inks]ed up. Of course, portrayals of pedophilia or rape exist-just like the inclusion of a child molester in "Dubliners" by James Joyce, or the rape scene in “The Fountainhead”, but they aren’t being literally drawn out for one to view.

Isn’t it also somewhat common for vending machines to include used panties from school girls in Japan? The CNN article I read last week mentioned that, but it didn’t mention if that was going to be banned as well.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Isn’t it also somewhat common for vending machines to include used panties from school girls in Japan? The CNN article I read last week mentioned that, but it didn’t mention if that was going to be banned as well.

You could find such things in certain seedier parts of the Kantō Plain megalopolis in the nineties and I think maybe into the first decade of this century, but it's been banned for a while now, and the idea that it was ever widespread is an urban legend. The shoddy pornography and prostitution laws have always been a much more serious and complex problem than that, although it's certainly one of the issue's more lurid manifestations. It's worth noting that most Japanese people are absolutely mortified by their country's sex industry and how much press it gets in other parts of the world.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/18/japan-bans-possession-child-abuse-images-excludes-comics-video-games-anime

Skip the article, read the comments.

Or, rather, don't do that. Don't do that. Seriously, seriously don't do that.

[Platypus]

My opinion on Japan is moderately well known around here, and a large part of my intense dislike for that nation comes from the general attitudes to sexuality in various forms.

[Lief 🗽]

Wait, up until now child pornography was legal but show an unblurred penis wasn't?? What a weird country...

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Wait, up until now child pornography was legal but show an unblurred penis wasn't?? What a weird country...

Child pornography was never legal to produce or distribute, but it was legal to possess.

[Beet]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/18/japan-bans-possession-child-abuse-images-excludes-comics-video-games-anime

Skip the article, read the comments.

Or, rather, don't do that. Don't do that. Seriously, seriously don't do that.

It wasn't worse than I was expecting.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/18/japan-bans-possession-child-abuse-images-excludes-comics-video-games-anime

Skip the article, read the comments.

Or, rather, don't do that. Don't do that. Seriously, seriously don't do that.

It wasn't worse than I was expecting.

The description of the Japanese countryside as grim and bleak came as something of a surprise, because to the extent that the Japanese countryside sometimes is kind of depressing to be in it's distinctly because people are leaving it rather than the other way around and if you take that into account it's really not grim or bleak at all. You'd think Nagano Prefecture was Wuthering Heights or something from that comment. But yeah, I wasn't expecting any better than this either.

[Simfan34]

The description of the Japanese countryside as grim and bleak came as something of a surprise... But yeah, I wasn't expecting any better than this either.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The description of the Japanese countryside as grim and bleak came as something of a surprise... But yeah, I wasn't expecting any better than this either.

I was expecting plenty of vaguely racist, almost concern-trolling stereotypes about Japan. That particular description isn't really a vaguely racist, almost concern-trolling stereotype about Japan that you see very much compared to the others, and it's not worse than the others, so the comments as a whole aren't 'worse than I was expecting'.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Obviously it's the right thing to do, but that law seems to go further than US laws in that it prohibits the drawing of children in sexual situations.  I'm not exactly sure how that would be enforced ("Officer, I swear I thought that drawing was eighteen!"), but I'm not up on Japanese culture and I don't read or watch anime and manga.  Am I not understanding this correctly?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Obviously it's the right thing to do, but that law seems to go further than US laws in that it prohibits the drawing of children in sexual situations.  I'm not exactly sure how that would be enforced ("Officer, I swear I thought that drawing was eighteen!"), but I'm not up on Japanese culture and I don't read or watch anime and manga.  Am I not understanding this correctly?

Since anime and manga are (wrongly, in my opinion) exempted, I'm not sure you're understanding it correctly, and I'm not sure I am either for that matter since 'exempting anime and manga' and 'prohibiting the drawing of children of sexual situations' seem to be mutually exclusive. I'd also point out that US law does in fact have that provision too (although it only applies to drawings that fail the Miller test), which I didn't know either until looking it up just now.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Obviously it's the right thing to do, but that law seems to go further than US laws in that it prohibits the drawing of children in sexual situations.  I'm not exactly sure how that would be enforced ("Officer, I swear I thought that drawing was eighteen!"), but I'm not up on Japanese culture and I don't read or watch anime and manga.  Am I not understanding this correctly?

Since anime and manga are (wrongly, in my opinion) exempted, I'm not sure you're understanding it correctly, and I'm not sure I am either for that matter since 'exempting anime and manga' and 'prohibiting the drawing of children of sexual situations' seem to be mutually exclusive. I'd also point out that US law does in fact have that provision too (although it only applies to drawings that fail the Miller test), which I didn't know either until looking it up just now.

Oh, you mean they are exempted.  My mistake - I though this law went as far as to ban art depicting child pornography, which I don't consider practical from a legal standpoint simply because art is subjective.

I, for the record, don't agree with the "I know it when I see it" rule because of that and I find it impossible to prove direct harm caused by virtual depictions of child sex.  (And apparently "virtual child pornography" is legal in the United States provided that it is not "obscene."  No idea what that's supposed to mean...)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I, for the record, don't agree with the "I know it when I see it" rule because of that and I find it impossible to prove direct harm caused by virtual depictions of child sex.  (And apparently "virtual child pornography" is legal in the United States provided that it is not "obscene."  No idea what that's supposed to mean...)

Well thats clarification for you. Clarify one area that is vague with yet another vague/subjective concept.

For a non-anime fan a lot could be considered obscene I would think. But if you have been watching the stuff since one night in 2005 you decided to stay up all night and decided to watch "family friendly" Cartoon Network in the early morning hours, your standards have been lowered (a sort of "I've seen worse mentality").

The other problem is, as was stated earlier, a lot of it is based around portraying children in adult positions/roles and/or foist a lot of "adult responsibility" on kids (...Usually involves saving the world), combine that with a lot of "fanservice" (sexual gestures and revealing clothing), as well as some nudity (which is actually visible if it is uncut version or if it is from the 1990's) and thus enforcing this gray area that nearly all animes delve into at least somewhat (with a few exceptions), may have been deemed impractical. A lot of this can be found in programs that are either unrated or TV-14 with a few exceptions, usually if there is extreme violence (which kicking someone in the head/and or ripping their heart out in the form of some kind of weird magical crystal or something I suppose, seemed to be acceptable Saturday Morning content in the mid 2000s in the US. That audience starts at 8, though that isn't as bad now I think).

Also, and getting back to your early comment about the inability to detect age, people on the internet have produced  "images" shall we say of characters from these shows that also opens up a whole discussion about copyright violations as well. These characters are often altered in the images to look older then they were in the original material.

[Simfan34]

The negative attention this has garnered reminds of the time a few years ago when Niger, I think it was (although it could have been Mauritania), was going to have an event where it freed a large number of slaves, but cancelled it after realising it bring attention to the fact that they still had legal slavery. The move backfired.

[Beet]

East Asia is typically treated with an exaggerated paranoid fear (Japan in the 1980s, China today), laughed at (North Korea) or put up as an exhibit for how weird "those people" are (often Japan today). The only consistent factor is that it is constantly Othered.