so dumg that something so vague can pass. GG tokyo.

this is pretty devastating,even more so because i cant do anything really about without moving to tokyo. :''(

This is quite unfortunate. I have to board a plane soon so I can't offer too many of my thoughts but I really do hope manga and anime companies fight as hard as they can against this. True, we foreign fans honestly can't do much to change things, so I can only hope the native ones do everything they can to dispute this. Since Japanese society as a whole is pretty passive though, I doubt we'll be seeing any actual outcry from fans.

Im glad for it. I hope to see much less schmuck in the coming years. I'm interested in good story and characters, not the stuff you should be embarrassed to watch with a respectable person in the room like your parents, or pastor. Although i'm sure all the angsty tweens and pedos will be mortified.

Good. All these 10-year olds with mini skirts and showing their panties with suggestive poses shit need to go.

inb4 everything else is ban...

I agree with Shamurai7 to some extent. Some of the stuff that gets published needs to be regulated. Some of that shit is disturbing. Guro and loli porn are prime examples...

...and this is how the Japanese economy failed.

Honestly everyone is entitled to their own cup of tea, because if you don't like loli or sexually themed animes, simply don't watch them.If you watch them in the same room as your parent and pastor(I wont even try to think of why your watching anime with your pastor) and if you know they're innappropriate,shame on you.Don't blame the makers of porn because you watched it.

@Halidar While I can agree that some things are better left unseen, they will never actually disappear. Enforced regulation can help in some ways, but when its this vague it does nothing at all but transition an entire medium into the black market. Its the same justification as saying, "Weird porn shouldn't be seen, so all movies are bad by default." You can even make the argument that its not worth the trouble anyway. Something truly bad, if most people were to stumble upon it, would just be avoided. If a person truly enjoyed the deeper levels of depravity, they would seek it out, and they would find it, without fail. Worst case, maybe make their own. Just something to ponder.
On to the point, I'm still not overly worried about this. Its tragic, but an industry with that pumps that much money into the (struggling) economy will not be troubled by this too long. Simply moving headquarters is the most obvious and drastic step, but even restricting their sales as per the law will start some pretty noticeable waves in the market. I have faith in Kadokawa's push back.
tl:dr: This sucks.

This is horrible ;-; Hopefully it'll get repealed...or at least stay in Tokyo

So does this mean that all loli manga is going to undergo a fire sale in stores right now? That means it's time to BUY BUY BUY.

The worst part about all this is, this law is probably not based on any fact whatsover. *sigh* I hate people sometimes.

In the end, this law isn't to protect people, it's just there because some people said they didn't like it. That's a stupid reason to create any law. They really don't have much right to, but they'll do it anyways.

That said, this feels like it's so vague it'll be ineffective.

Also, I was under the impression Otakus made up a lot of the vote. I'm sure they won't be happy about people who let this pass...

Shut. Down. EVERYTHING.

Okay, I just read the Kanemitsu blog's summary, and the contradiction that makes me mad is the fact that actually marketing to adults is indirectly prohibited (the 6 strikes rule). It's lazy, really. "Oh, we don't want anything offensive to get into the hands of minors, so you can't make anything offensive for anyone."

Also, swimsuits? Really? WTF.

Anyone else find it ironic that this story is surrounded by adverts for Ikki Tousen?

I think they screwed over their own economy even more now. ._.

I knew it... With the spread-out discrimination towards otakus, no wonder this bill got passed... This is really a big discrimination, or basically, a social malice, a bias move... The thing that makes me furious is the obvious discrimination. It's too obvious yet people turn a blind eye, they dont try to understand others. Seems like Tokyo is a social disappointment. If you'll apply a ban, at least ban everybody. But that's not what they are doing. They are specifically banning games, animes, and mangas while leaving film, photography, and other industries alone and away from this ban. Hopefully, Tokyo realize what they have done... This might bring a significant decrease on Tokyo's economy.

As to those who are worried about watching/reading "adult" material for religious--typically judeo-christian archetypes--you are imposing your beliefs on products of a nation that as a majority does not share your beliefs. These products are made by the Japanese for the Japanese (Rapelay anyone?), and thus your religious conscious being offend by it really has no bearing, don't like it don't view it.

Concerning the crowd that complains about depictions of fetishes that don't float their boats, that is fine; however, there are those that who do enjoy such extreme ends of the fetish market, id est those that typically would be illegal in a real life scenario. I am of the mind that those individuals need a fictional outlet for said fetishes. Perhaps some will graduate to real life activities someday however unfortunate that may be. But you would be a fool to think that without such fictional depictions these individuals would not exist. So by all means should they not be offered something that might stem their desires before they overflow into reality?

The human psyche is far to complex to blame all the malignancies that can surface upon fictional works. To do so is to shirk a large aspect of what it is to human, which by definition are deviant. Those law makers, in any nation, who think they are protecting anybody by limiting "lewd" materials are far to arrogant and naive to be in a position of power. I hardly think the first ever rapist/pedophile/>insert sexual deviancy here< had just finished reading the latest ero-manga before he decided to commit to his act.

I still think y'all're overreacting.

Time to take up the defensive and be ready to explain what this law is really about to people looking in from the outside. Stuff like this makes me wish that we (the US) where more involved in the creation of "anime like" content and not completely reliant on Japanese publishers for material.

Time to break into my liquor cabinet & create a monster cocktail.

Hey, can anyone think of something really angry for me to listen to while I drink? This is the only one that I'm thinking of for some reason:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQXLs9sbyM0

Hope somebody can think of something else!

To celebrate what was once dirty, I implore you to watch this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tpb1U6GFSgw

As for their economy...yeah, they've screwed the pooch big time.

"I still think y'all're overreacting."

It's so clear that far to many people don't seem to understand the implications of this law could have. It's the slippery slopes of politics. Crack a history text sometime and you will see many horrible injustices started when people misjudged the ramifications of one event.

What's next? Kempeitai 2.0 looking over your shoulder to check your reading matterial for offensive images?

Hopefully, this law will simply result in most of the animation companies, stores, and events relocating to other cities. Once Tokyo no longer has that Akihabara and Comiket money coming in, they'll likely reconsider.

In any case, this is a bad day for artistic freedom.

I love how most of the comments for this and the last entry about this are people who just read the title and nothing else.

Well .....I just want to know how much this is going to affect the Japanese economy. Guess some other country is going to have to take the straps and produce what we want.

I still just really wish I could get the full bill. Not someone's annotations, the full document, with all the nuances in wording that people usually discard in order to sensationalize bills. I'm not saying this can't be a limiting move, but I want to know the extent of its power, the kinds of things it is trying to regulate, so on so forth.

All the complaining I'm seeing is only proving their point. Do you really need objectionable material in every major show of the season to enjoy it?

@The-Excel
Anything that is of artistic merit will offend someone. Now that they've decided to limit the amount of artistic expression that can be expressed in one way, they'll be able to extend that to others.

If they can say sexual situations damage the development of youth, they can easily apply that to violence, to other illegal activities like stealing and vandalism, and even to just general mischief - all using this bill as justification.

It's a precedent that has been set - animation, comics and video games are not afforded the same creative freedom as other mediums, and thus, they can be regulated to the point where anything that might offend someone can be 'taken care of'.

Here is the thing the Publishers are telling Mangakai they can't draw School theme stories anymore nor can they have a character in a School uniforms because it promotes sexual perversion (which is true) and unhealthy for youth.

Which is kind of stupid telling people school is bad idea for a story setting but main the issue is the sexual content in that story not the setting.Japanese Publishers are being force not to make Manga's with School theme stories because of this Law.

Mostly my reaction to the bill is a facepalm, flailing hands and but! fiction! What do I care about someone else's 'objectionable*'? But, fiction!

*ooh, nice and vague

@Crobdan

People have read the article. The problem is that people (including myself) are probably too furious to write something that may appear intelligent.

unless this is repealed, anime is dead

the end is nigh people

"Anything that is of artistic merit will offend someone."
Well that's just plain not true.


Half of what some'a y'all are saying is either unsubstantiated assumptions or outright fallacies, and I really wish y'all'd stop and think before posting sensationalism.

Japan can't criminalize homosexuality. It tried once, and failed (in 1873, no less!). Not even a paranoid asshat like Ishihara could pull that off.

But when game and animation studios start to leave Tokyo (I really do think this will happen, simply because relocating would save them far more money than staying would) there could be some pretty serious backlash.
Will watch with interest...

@marlin it is absolutely true.
You can even find someone that is offended by the Mona Lisa.
And everyone that is saying they won't miss the panty shots, does this somehow exclude excessive violence? I haven't seen anything saying that this bill doesnt due to how vague it is.

Seriously, You have people in the US getting Harry Potter banned because of witchcraft and you don't think you can find someone to be offended by anything?

What happened? Did Japan suddenly decide Puritanism was in? Homosexuality, really?

@Marlin Clock
Artistic expression is all about pushing boundaries and making people think. You can't do this if you don't challenge peoples' values, and if you challenge peoples' values, you are going to step on more than a few toes.

@Marlin Clock

Yes, we are reacting strongly, because this bill is the slippery slope. There's no other reason that this could have been established other than the TMG deciding that its ability to restrict filthy otaku (while leaving "proper" media like live-action film and books untouched) was not enough.

And you DO have the whole bill. If you had bothered to visit Kanemitsu's site, which Josh has linked to repeatedly in the coverage, you'd see the most comprehensive coverage you can get for English speakers, even with translated editorials by legal analysts. It's the next best thing to your being able to speak perfect Japanese and reading the bill yourself, and it ain't pretty.

@Everyone who thinks this is a good thing because OH FINALLY WE'LL GET SOME GOOD ANIME HERP DERP DERP

"And you expect the absence of fanservice and ecchi to be replaced by deep plot and characterization...how?

While yes, anime that use H as a crutch would be less likely to reach production, that doesn't suddenly make deep anime more popular or profitable. Instead the bill might well kill those shallow, profitable anime that make studios the money they need to fund auteur productions.

You're making the mistake of thinking that people will naturally gravitate to "better" work once the stuff they like is banned. That's simply not true. If all TV programs except Dancing with the Stars or some other crap were erased from the earth, you still can't assume that Dancing's ratings would suddenly skyrocket. Sure, the fans would still watch, as would some other people that have nothing better to do, but for the most part people would just stop watching TV at all.

No, no no. You think you're supporting a restriction on smut, but what you're actually doing is tacitly approving the policing of thought. What if the TMG decided that a show like Redline "grossly exaggerated and glorified" the influence of criminal activity in competitive racing? Harmful! Banned!

What if the TMG decided that Eden of the East supported terrorism? Harmful! Banned!

MAKE NO MISTAKE. It will NOT stop at sex. Ishihara practically shouted it to the heavens. Anything that doesn't align with his moral compass (INCLUDING homosexuals), he will attempt to eventually expand this bill to cover."

@Everyone that says "Let's wait and see what they do with all this newfound power"

This isn't an issue of finally giving Tokyo the ability to reign in the otaku. THEY ALREADY HAVE THAT ABILITY. Like Ichigo during a training arc, they've worked some magic and made that power STRONGER. Unnecessarily so!

Let's take a hypothetical situation, and say the bill was applied to homosexuality instead.

The expansion of the bill's scope is the equivalent of going from being able to restrict the sale of Kuso Miso Technique (look it up), if it somehow hasn't been labeled as porn already (it has), to being able to restrict appearances by Bruno Tolioni...because, y'know, he's TOTALLY gay, amirite?

This is how vague the whole thing has become, and I see neither reason or practicality in it, except to satisfy the moral panicking of a group of senile, prudish old men.

@The-Excel What is objectionable is relative. As such I am tempted to seriously answer yes to your question. But the truth of the mater is one of perspective. I have my own morals that I do not force on others and would rather not have theirs forced on me.

Call me arrogant if you like but if it has to be one way or the other I would certainly chose my own sense of morals and justice over that of a group. The anime industry would be fine in such a situation completely untouched by what I would consider objectionable. Not that I enjoy all aspects of it I simply see no harm done by fiction context is not important.

@Marlin Clock I am not sure I consider what the7k to be an absolute(would have to give it some thought) but I have met people who would likely consider everything I have seen that has come out of Japan offensive. Don't underestimate differences in culture and morality. This law could devastate the industry by its vagueness it could also be nothing and prove to be a simple scare tactic. While we could be missing some facts as I see it at the moment the writing is on the wall as to how potentially devastating the nature of this law is. I don't think crying about it is really being sensationalistic so much as genuine panic over something of value being trampled upon.

From the looks of it it seems that this will affect most likely stuff like Queen's Blade, Oretama, Kiss X Sis, and Seikon no Qwaser and misc shows of that caliber. Seeing that it says nothing about legal sexual depictions, slight implications that barely show anything or anything innuendo, its not going to be too bad. It also says nothing about illegalizing the showing of the chest area of characters in anime and manga.

In terms of nudity, we mostly see the breasts and that might still be intact as long as its not considered harmful, so there are chances of some aspects of ecchi might still be around except just with no borderline stuff. It will just depend on the target age group and considering that showing the chest area of anyone under 18 is not considered child porn in Japan and there is a regulation for that already according to a link in one of the articles that Josh linked us. There is a chance that seeing full boobs whether ginormous, big, just right, small, or flat will still be intact.

To those who want to continue their stuff as it is without worrying about the sales, relocate to areas outside of Tokyo. For now we will just have to see what standards they will consider when July comes around. If all goes to chaos, a revolution will arise until everything comes to a better resolution after the battle is over or we will hear about a new area of Japan being the new center place for anime and manga.

Even then, it is still the parents fault for not preparing their kids and teaching them right since its better to teach them and have them face the truth than to hide secrets out of fear of corruption. They are never too young to learn anything new and trust will be an important factor in this teaching.

Hey soon-to-be defunct doujin artists and anime studios: FREE SPEECH AMERICA IS OPEN FOR BUSINESS!!

(Yes, I do realize whackjob religious right wingers will use obscenity laws, but I'm trying to lighten the mood here.)

Law can enforce deed, but law cannot prevent thought. If the internet has taught me anything, it's that if an outlet does not exist, an outlet will be made. Idiotic laws made to put a shine on politicians' smiles for the next election can come down like a hammer, but like a whack-a-mole game with the difficulty setting cranked to max, the thoughts suppressed keep popping up.

Anime, manga, and video games as they are now are not the source of Japan's otaku-based social ills - they're merely the symptoms of the real illness, and should point to the actual problems in society that have lead to declining birth rates and the upswing of "herbivore men" in the country. The state of the modern otaku is the proverbial canary in the coal mine, not the nexus of all that is evil.

My shining sun-fist is raised in brotaku-ism with the publishers and artists here. I don't like or approve of sex crime, but I reject, completely, the idea of singling out games, manga, and anime as the newly-minted "second class citizens" of storytelling media. That is patently bullshit, and I hope the publishing companies concentrate all fire on not only sinking this, but revealing those involved in its creation look like the buffoons with only sketchy research to stand on that they are.

Haters gonna hate, but creators gonna create!

I am okay with this. Frankly I find Japan's mainstream sexualization of minors to be slightly distasteful, and on bad days, disturbing. I do think that this kind of legislation is not the best way to deal with this problem, and I do acknowledge the "slippery slope" arguments, however I feel that a lot of people here are overreacting. The gov is probably going to be slightly stricter, but even so, it will probably only be marginally so. There will be no Equilibrium-esque book burning. There will be no loli witch hunts. There will be no dystopian society censorship. It will probably be much milder and less interesting than you think.

Secondly, all you folks saying things pertaining to Japan's economy, you guys do realize that the entertainment industry makes up a miniscule portion of the Japanese economy right? Manga and anime or drops of water in an ocean of services, fishing, and every sort of manufacturing imaginable. You know nothing about economics. Please stop talking about it.

It's the sound of a million otakus raging in unison. The source of porn is gone..

@ittoujuu

Hell to the yeah!

@Doctor Tran I wanted to say something about the economic factor but I wasn't sure how minuscule a part the otaku industry makes.

As long that this doesnt affect the violence and/or quality of the stories, I'm kinda happy since i don't care about little nude girls. But if they're going to censore every bit of violence, that will be bad

@Doctor Tran

Your post reads like a Rorschach test that for some reason makes the words "Jews", "Communists" and "Trade Unionists" pop up in my head. Funny, hmm?

@Doctor Tran: I was waiting for a comment like that. "mainstream sexualization of minors"- yeah, I mean, sure that may not BREED pedos, but it sure doesn't discourage it either.

People also need to remember that just because it's 'freedom of expression' (I don't see how sexualized loli's are "an expression") doesn't mean it's really okay. For example, early cartoons in America often depicted blacks as stereotypical and in blackface; Jews were usually shown with over sized noses and were always plotting on how to obtain money. These were accepted back then because a large portion of society thought it was okay- was it? Based on many comments here, I'm getting that expression, no matter what it is, should be allowed simply because it's expression. "No children were harmed" some say. Well, no blacks/Jews were TECHNICALLY harmed as a DIRECT result of those cartoons, should those bans be lifted from those as well?

My point is, when you're in a business, and your business is attracting large amounts of profit and attention, you're going to have to keep it... a little more.. "tame". Anime is getting more and more popular in Japan and across the globe. And let's be honest- sexy shit, violence, WHATEVER; in big business, it's not really always about expression, it's about money- and if sex and violence is what the consumer wants, that's what they get. That's why it sells so well- because that's what a lot of otaku want. If were to lose interest in loli-themed anime/related media, I'm sure that big business would not produce it as much.

But for the record, no I'm not some anime-Nazi, "back in the days" old fart. I like my share of "adult entertainment", all I'm saying is, with anime becoming ever more so popular all around the world...

What did you expect?