I'm actually surprised such bills don't appear here in the US more often, what with the whole christian conservatism thing and all.

Either way, broadening the bill so that it infringes upon whatever fetishes an even larger share of the populace (including gov officials) enjoy is just asking for it to fail by an even larger margin this time around. I suppose they just want to keep media attention on the matter, because it makes no sense otherwise

as i said on ANN, this bill makes no sense to me. from what i can figure, the age of consent in japan varies from 13 to 18 depending on the area. so in the case of loli/shota this is very vague. say a character is 13-banned in one area but not in another cuz its not "illegal in real life" in one that area but is in the other. so dumb and vague. and why the hell would incest manga bother ANYONE? wouldnt that ban a lot of religious books or would those be unfair exceptions ...most religions ive read have quite a bit of incest in them.

in short ,this whole thing is stupid and i hope it does fail not because i support any certain fetish but just because it's a fail bill that makes no sense and isnt banning anything proven harmful

Being a christian conservative myself, I have to say I'm not at all surprised that this kind of bill is rare here in the US. Conservatives want the gov't to stay out of our lives and not get too powerful, and this kind of bill is the exact opposite of that.

@Kougeru: Of course it doesn't make a lick of sense. It doesn't even approach the definition of logical.

But then again, to use the line from STAR TREK IV: "Whoever said the human race was logical?"

The silver lining is that it will fail--or at least, we can hope and pray that it does.

Sorry, but I don't see why we should be against this...

I might sound a bit puritanical here, but isn't it logical that stuff cashing in (I think most eroge just have porn, in order to make 'pervs' buy it, not because the makers are perverted -at least, that's what the naive me wants to believe) on fetishes that are illegal IRL gets banned? I mean, stuff like rape and child pornography is just wrong, and I don't think people who think it's 'kinky' should just be given what they want.

I know we have freedom of speech, and I don't care about the whole social disruption, but I think that what this comes down to, is some kind of child porn (of course, I'm talking about actual X-rated porn stuff with children in it, not just loli characters) which should be illegal at all time.

I'm specifically not mentioning incest here, because morally, I can't see anything wrong with it in theory (if you really love someone, you really love someone. Full stop. However it shouldn't just be used for teh lulz or because some people think it's 'kinky' *ahemkissxsisahem*) But I understand they take it with the rape and the child porn, since it is also forbidden by law (for rather obvious reasons).

Anyways, correct me if you think I'm wrong and babbling nonsense that has nothing to do with anything. I really don't want to sound like a fundamentalist conservative redneck, because I'm really, really not.

@Aquagaze: Because if they take away my Strike Witches I'll be a sad panda :(

Anime chars have no ages anyways. What's stopping creators following the passing of such a bill from saying all their loli characters have some hormone imbalance that disrupts their aging process and are actually all 18+? This is all a bit ridiculous anyways.

@capncrunch

Yeah, if they take away Strike Witches, then alcoholism will surely follow.

@Josh Tolentino

Yeah, this is a step forward, leap backward kind of thing.

As for my own opinion, I say this. This is just an attempt by these individuals to make themselves look better while not actually doing anything useful for the society.

Is a lot of what they talk about nasty & wrong. Perhaps, but in video games, anime, and manga, it's not real.

I would go on, but I feel I would break into my own liquor cabinet, and drink about half of it. If anyone wants to hear more of my opinion about this, then let me know.

@Aquagaze The reason things such as rape and child porn are "wrong" is because of the victim. In the case of a depiction its nothing more then an idea. No one is being victimized. There is no case for saying it is "wrong" to do anything to a fictional character regardless of what it is in any light without infringing on free speech, thought policing, and moral enforcement. All of which I personally find far more offensive.

Stop for a moment and think about other things that are considered "wrong" such as violence and murder.(I can easily come up with a longer list if you like) Killing people is something that happens in games, manga, anime, and other works regularly. Hell I don't even need to cite Death Note I can pull up an example of something recent in Index S2. This past episode saw characters violently teleporting objects into each others bodies. Including Kuroko who is a good guy! thereby depicting what she did in a positive light. Then comes the Accelerator who proves hes also one of the good guys by smashing in the face of an already half dead villain. Should I assume that since you enjoyed watching the episode that you also take pleasure in smashing the faces of your enemies in your daily life? Or are the two completely separate things? My example might be a bit extreme but I hope you can see my point.

While I don't personally enjoy many of what I would consider disturbing choices in entertainment such as depictions of rape that come out of Japan I still see a clear distinction between real and not. I will go so far as to say I find it incredibly unfair to mark someone who does enjoy lolicon material or even rape depicted as a good thing enjoyable as "wrong".

Pretty sure this will fail. I don't see a point in limiting people who are legally considered adults from buying fictional pornography regardless of whatever fetish it is.

I keep seeing people claim "This is best for the youth to not get corrupted by perverts." but who would buy their kids pornography? Probably no responsible parent. As long as stores don't sell it to anyone underage, what's the big problem?

Parents should go do what parents do, raise their kids in the way they believe is best, not push their views onto everyone else in the society.

Punishing people for victimless crimes like loli or incest fiction is absurd. There are better things for the government to worry about.

@Aquagaze:

You could apply the same logic like this. We don't want you to own media with cute animals. Even if you think they're 'cute'. You could potentially think of getting a pet, destroy your mental health and that of your kitten. Even though the animals you saw don't exist in reality. Yeah, it does sound silly like that doesn't it? :)

I'm getting rather tired of these things. Why is there not a thing like this at the end of 'Freedom of speech and expression for everyone', no ifs and buts. Period.

@Yuusen - Of course it does, because the analogy has absolutely nothing to do with Aquagaze's original point. Owning a pet isn't illegal. Rape and child pornography are. Lifelong's rebuttal is far more pertinent, but the fact remains thatthere aren't enough studies going around indicating the sort of effect that viewing these media have on 'real world' behaviour.

Politics it just flat out sucks.
Things that people go for in the real world don't necessarily translate into the real world. Even for those whom anime/manga is a lifestyle. To want to judge the virtual by real life standards is just pointless. The fact of the matter is they just don't exist. Seeking to keep this under a tight lid only gives it more attention than it should be allowed.

Lifesong: The reason things such as rape and child porn are "wrong" is because of the victim. In the case of a depiction its nothing more then an idea. No one is being victimized.

I don't need to be a victim to know rape and child porn are wrong. Even worse when it is commercialized. Period.

Personally I really can't see the need for expanding the bill, it really will just hurt more than it helps, now if they were to re-focus the bill on making certain things like lolicon depicting the violent rape and abuse of children, I really can't see why people would be opposed to that.

I think that, aside from the sexual issues themselves, there's a twofold problem inherent in the structure of such a bill.

1. Politicians love trumping up "enemies of the week," like a bad sentai show, setting these "easy targets" up so they can drum up legislation to knock them down and look like the "good guy," or to play as a gambit come re-election time. "I not only supported this bill that would protect children, I -drafted- it! What's it gonna be, opponent-from-the-other-party? Kowtow to me and admit my bill is right, or be seen as a supporter of rape and incest?" If a person has a chance to talk something like this through with another person of reasonable intelligence, they can generally see beyond the powerful knee-jerk reaction this kind of political move aims to capitalize on, but when group-think prevails, the whole "but think of the CHILDREN!" mentality tends to steamroll everything. It pisses me off that people basically take that as carte blanche to go into hysterics and try to zap everything that might even be potentially harmful. I DO think that pornographic materials should be kept out of the hands of minors, definitely. The hardcore stuff especially - with the garden-variety stuff, for a young man, learning how to ferret it out is almost a right of passage, like an animal learning how to hunt for itself in the wild.

2. Kids and young people are impressionable. All people are, to an extent, impressionable. But I think a lot of legislation treats kids like they're practically brain-dead robots just ripe for flash-programming as killers and sexual deviants. My personal experiences have been pretty mixed - I've met 7 and 8-year olds with surprising maturity, and I've met 14-year olds who should probably be given lessons by the aforementioned 8-year olds, but I don't think any of them was so dumb that they completely lack a sense of social context for their actions. If they really lack that, that's a sign of a much bigger psychological problem. And you know what? As much as this point has been beaten like so many dead horses in the violent video games debate, directing a child's development in that sector is the responsibility of a parent. Parents, family, and friends help establish that context through which kids and young people interpret this information. In the U.S., an 8-year old isn't PREVENTED from seeing an R-rated movie; they just have to be accompanied by a parent. It's the parent's responsibility to explain how and why swearing is used, why character A shot character B, or why this guy is sleeping with a woman who isn't his wife (and/or, the details of what men and women sleeping together entails). To me, that's an endorsement of the idea that children are indeed able to process and integrate these ideas, if explained responsibly and clearly. Whether it's okay to show a child of X age will vary with each individual's growth, and that's why it's ultimately a parental decision.

The problem with this kind of legislation is, even if the government doesn't lean heavily on it, there's always the possibility that they can/will in the future, and that is enough to swerve what creators create, even the ones whose works would not be classified as erotica. Sanctions in the sale of these materials would also have that "chilling effect," resulting in fewer being produced. To be honest, I think a temporary chill on that kind of stuff might be helpful to jump-start the anime/manga industry out of its current state, but I wouldn't take it at the cost of having that legislation be in place forever from there on out. And besides, creators do tend to find loopholes in legislation, where it appears (the apparent answer to that being this version of the bill's "age doesn't matter" clause).

The most damning part of the bill, to me, is that it targets anime, manga, and games while seeming to ignore film and television. I just cannot take that kind of double standard seriously as a piece of legislation. I would ask them, "if this was applied to all storytelling media, would your vote be different?" There's no reason why it shouldn't be all-or-nothing, since that's what it would take to keep the lawmakers honest. It's very, very easy to throttle stuff that you don't like or care about, but if this law were applied to the common citizen's TV dramas or direct-to-DVD films, why, I'm given to believe it would not pass muster at any level of the Japanese government.

But enough rambling (from me); have at them!

Let's keep it simple: It's damn fiction, so if you don't like it, don't read it, don't watch it.

Rape/child pornography/guro or whatever else is wrong in real life. That has nothing to do with fiction. Have a problem with them? then deal with the real problems and rescue real abused victims. Censoring it from fiction won't take the problem away.

It's sad some people like to live in a bubble pretending if they cover their ears the problem will just disappear.

It's true that there are forms of media that depict other obscene material, such as murder and theft, (child pornography)... all of these things are illegal, but I guess what it boils down to in the end..

Is which crime society deems acceptable or not?

^or rather, more heinous.

"If they were real"

SERIOUSLY? lol. That's like saying "well, if EVA was real, would we allow that to happen."

@_@

"Is considered harmful to a minor’s mental health regarding sexuality"
Well, obviously, if my little brother came home to me braising the ham to The Best Damn H-Game Period, he'd be very confused why girl's anuses weren't sprouting tentacles during his first time too.

@AriesWarlock You may not but moral prejudice and because I said so logic have no place in a court of law. At least not any law I would want to live under.

The "it's all just fiction" logic is firmly established.

So I wish to ask, just how does a child's mental well-being find itself disfigured from watching animé, reading manga, and playing games?

I have seen 5-year-olds playing Counter-Strike with scary proficiency, but it never once crossed my mind that they had their mental health harmed.

Similarly, do you feel as if you have harmed your mental health by consuming such media?

isn't it obvious that they're all idiots? This alone will ban nearly all the hentai they have, and also their porn. Seriously, who wants to watch legalized porn/hentai? everyone in there would be at least 20. e_e

It's not going to get passed.

@Yaku
So because it's only "fiction" it somehow makes it okay? The idea that somehow it's okay as long as you don't act upon it makes no sense at all. Wrong is wrong, and saying it's not hurting anyone is really a weak argument for trying to justify sick deprave behavior.

Seriously? Again?

Give it a rest Japanese government, you're not winning yourself any friends by trying to push these ridiculous laws. If some sick fuck gets his jollies to raping children, so be it as long as it stays in the virtual realm and never crosses over to the real world. Really, that and keeping the sick stuff out of the hands of children until they're ready to make their own decisions are really my only issues with questionable material since it's not being forcibly shoved in front of me.

It makes sense why they would do that I suppose. Then again, some people take it way too far (and become confused with reality etc.etc...)

I can hear Kirino's screams and cries now for this bill : [
(Oreimo)

@AriesWarlock
I'm sure you don't need to be a victim to know rape is wrong, but a crime needs to be committed for it to be considered a crime. And in the case of reading fictional works, I assure you no crime is being committed.

As I read the contents of this bill I found myself utterly outraged by its ridiculous hypocrisy and how they shamelessly oppress certain kinds of media. The fact that they think they can get away with restricting contents in manga, anime, and games but not "written text and material involving real people such as photographs, TV and movies" is just appalling. If they at least have the balls to go against all types of media, then I'll at least have respect, however much I may disagree. But this is just the politicians trying to manipulate the public using misleading assumptions and its fear of things unfamiliar.

And the argument that acts considered illegal in real life should not be allowed in fictional works simply doesn't hold water. Whether or not it's sex related is irrelevant. I would also like to point out that while the legality of the act of incest itself is debated throughout the world (It's legal in some states in the US, given both parties are adults), this bill is trying to ban it in fictional works. In other words, it's saying while it may be legal to do in real life, it cannot be drawn on a piece of paper.

"To protect the children" seems to be every politician's holy crusade nowadays, which I find to be just oh so noble and selfless (I personally could not give two shits about your kids). As the article mentioned, there are already regulations in this regard. Blaming the materials and trying to restrict it all together is not the right way, it's just the easy way to pass off the blame. Following this bill's logic, they might as well ban beverages that have alcohol content, but they will have to pry the rum from my cold, dead hand.

Regardless of the morality issue or taste, I for one firmly believe in the rights for these things to exist. And to those of you who say "Why not?" because you don't care for these materials, know that if they can get away with this today, there's no saying that they won't come for things you value tomorrow. Because like war, politic never changes, and it will always need things to bash on.

I think the key reasoning for the failing of the bill is located at the bottom of Dan Kanemitsu translation and summary.

Keep in mind that the Tokyo Metropolitan Government already has the power to keep sexually-stimulating material out of the hands of minors, so this law essentially aims to grandly broaden the coverage of unilateral restriction (or forced self-regulation on part of the affected industries), specifically targeting anime, manga and videogames, and ignoring TV, film, and novels.

Canada has a similarly crappy rule actually in effect. I've lost a few doujinshi to it. After some research, the literal law here states "there is no proof that it is linked to the actual sexual behavior". So yeah, we have a law based on no proof that freely states it isn't. Note this applies to imports, I don't know how Canada covers things MADE here.

I hope Japan doesn't pass this. I hate to see the government meddling in things it has no right to.

As always, I'm amazed by how some people think it's alright to trample over other people's rights about what FICTION they can access just so they can force their own moralities over others.

@thatguyukno

Ok smart guy, let's backpedal a bit. Who ever said that that "because it's fiction it's ok"? Listen, whether you like it or not, fiction and fantasy can and will describe sick filth just as they can describe the most beautiful utopia, but as they imply, what they describe is not real, meaning no real person got victimized. Get it through your thick head. Want to 'protect' people from reading the sick filth? there's already something called ratings, warnings and also parenting when it involves minors. Don't like it? don't read, watch, nor play it.

@Yaku

LOL U MAD?

But in all seriousness, I do like that your so angry that you believe I'm part of some group trying to oppress people "rights" because it's moral ect. I never mentioned anything about moralities, I simply don't see how you can justify a "right" to and a need for things like lolicon and such. I personally do not care how people get their um. .. "jollies" in their own home (with things like child pornography (some of which lolicon would fall under the exception)), I'm simply astonished at the entitlement mentality that people have a "right" to view, collect, and display these things. No where does it say you have a right to such things, I would use the fact a guy in Iowa had to take a plea agreement, to avoid a major jail sentence (for what most believe to be lolicon though we will likely not know the actual content).

Now all that said if you can provide me a reasonable argument as to why people have a right to it, and why it has a reason for anything other than that's how some sick people toss their rocks off with some KY. I would like to hear it, but if your going to continue to insult me don't bother.

I dislike censorship as much as the next person, but you have to draw a line somewhere, otherwise who's to argue that child porn is just an example of "how some people think it's alright to trample over other people's rights".

Yeah, I'm not exactly a fan of a lot of the loli stuff, or the guro stuff, or the incest stuff, and a few others things.

The way I deal with it? Don't partake of it. It's that damn simple. As soon as you start banning fictional depictions of sexual acts because it would be illegal to do in real life, it's a slippery slope before we see the banning of fictional depictions of ALL illegal acts. Wouldn't that REALLY suck?

You should read a little thing called "First they came...", as it will give you a much better look at why you should protect things that you don't particularly enjoy. As long as it hurts no one and it is forced upon no one, it should be legal.

Don't get your panties in a bundle (especially the hentai ones). As usual with this kind of thing, it can't be enforced. Something so vague shoots itself in the foot, because the people you try to use it on can contest it every time and will often win. Alternately, trying to go after everyone makes you the bad guy (the RIAA route).

Now I can already hear another comment going, "But Japan--! Conformity! They'll take all the hentai and people will go along with it to save face ZOMG!" No. It's not like we're the only place with an artistic community, or the only culture that wants porn, or the only place where prudes have power. People are the same all over.

Plus, there's the vast lawless void of the Internet.

So, I'm not worried.

^exactly. C'mon, it's the INTERNETS.
ppl will always find a way.

"Yeah, I'm not exactly a fan of a lot of the loli stuff, or the guro stuff, or the incest stuff, and a few others things."- ditto

@thatguyukno

Presumably you have access to the Bible and have read the chapter on Lot, his wife, and his daughters who got themselves pregnant by having sex with their dad.

Presumably you should fight for the ban on the Bible as well - then we can start agreeing you are not fighting against an entitlement strawman.

@Lifesong: H-Hoe dare you drag Index into this? No actually, you're right. I also don't like how Index portrays Kuroko, a twelve-year-old girl as such a pervert, or Accelerator, also an teenager, as a deranged psychopath, but I am indeed willing to forgive that because I love it so much.

What I just wanted to say is that I think people who play child porn/rape games are rather sick, and I think most of you agree with me, but it is true that the Japanese government shouldn't be so bothered about this when their are not that much cases of actual rape/pedophilia/etc. 'inspired' by these games taking place.

So, in short, the conclusion we reach here:

fiction=fiction --> doing such things in fiction is rather sick
reality=reality--> doing such things IRL is illegal
ergo, as long as there is no link between the first and the second, there is not a legal problem.

Ah, lovely, discussions on morality on a wednesday morning...

Have you all read the fourth bullet point up there?

"Where the depiction / representation of the act is presented in an unjustifiably glorified or overly emphasized manner"

Yeah, it sucks that it's not for all fiction, but I can't say that I'm completely against it.

Man, zombies come back fewer times than this bill has.... cut it's legs off, it crawls, cut it's arms off, it somehow gets prosthetics from other politicians.... I swear....


First, let me put something out here - It's probably not a surprise to those of you that know me, but I'm a card-carrying republican. I come from a rather strict christian upbringing (which I have no problem with), especially as far as sexuality is concerned.

Despite all this, I see no reason why such material should be illegal when referring to adults purchasing it. Spin it however you want, but fictional material is merely the expression of imagination - whether it be representations of giant robots or a 12 year old with an octopus on her rear.

You can call it "distasteful" or "corrupting" all you want, but it doesn't change the fact that it is an outlet of thought. So long as an expression of thought bears no ill will to real people or things, it's completely legal in the United States, since to do otherwise would be dangerously close to punishing "thought crimes".

Ultimately this is what it boils down to - Certain laws are meant to be absolute for good reason. The whims of society tend to be very spontaneous and rarely thought out, so like those of you here saying "I think that stuff is disgusting and therefore this is justified", pretend this was the topic of teens cutting themselves. Would you ban all razorblades in US because although the vast majority of people use them responsibly, an extremely small percentage are hurting themselves intentionally? Of course not. Not to mention the analogy that could be made here to right's encroachment (the whole "they banned [blank] but I didn't care because I didn't [do it/use it/own it], they banned etc.etc." for example).


tl;dr: ittoujuu just said it all a lot better.

"Is this sort of foolishness eventually bound for western shores?"

The U.S. is already like this. We have far more stigmas attached to this subject that most other nations. If anything Japan is responding to American criticisms about this and our current laws.

@core1065

How does the U.S. have anything like this bill? Anything that tries to do half of what this bill does would be shot down not only in congress, but in the supreme court as well. Furthermore, how do we "have far more stigmas attached to this subject"? Can we even measure that with our two cultures being quite different?

@Watchmaker163.

Chris Handley.

The UK has a law which makes it illegal to own a cartoon depicting a character represented as a child (defined in UK law as being under 18 years old) engaged in sexual behaviour.

Thus this ancient Roman cup is technically illegal.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sfgxd

So are the Gantz books in which the teenagers have sex.

Neither of these cases has been prosecuted, however.

@watchmaker163
The hot thing here in the US is videogame. Have you heard about Schwarzenegger's new shenanigans? They had a session in Supreme Court just a couple weeks ago.

These things are just easy targets for people to poke their pitch forks at. They are popular enough that the general public is aware of them, but not enough so that they understand them. And ignorance and indifference are powerful things that are easily manipulated.

Just off the top of my head, I can think of several well known movies that have explicit rape scenes, there are also tons of porn on the Internet with rape as its theme. They have every right to exist, and the same goes for every other form of fictional work.

A lot of people here speak of drawing a line for the sake of morality. And I agree. That's why there are ratings, why major stores don't carry AO games, why you can't find rape manga in goddamn Barnes and Noble. But you cannot deny people's rights to create and distribute, nor can you deny others from accessing such creations through proper methods.

When the expression of ideas starts to get regulated, where does it end? If I can't draw a manga about rape, can I write a novel about it? Can I talk about my rape fantasy with other people? Can I even think about it?

When it comes to freedom of expression, there's no pick-and-choosing. It's either all ok, or none of it is.

The West probably is forcing their hand into this. By West i mean is Western culture and belives. I hope it will fail.

@rewarp True, but didn't he plead guilty at the suggestion of his lawyer, rather than be truly convicted? And isn't he the only person who has been convicted under that law? Also, that law is much more specific than this bill.

@yenner No I hadn't, but now I do. Video games are a wonderful target for people to try and persuade the unwashed masses with in this country, though thankfully basically every attempt has been fail.

On another note, this header image is awesome:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-court-videos-20101103-6,0,7852742.story

Regarding this: "would excessively impede upon the formation of a healthy ability for judgement regarding sexuality of youth and there by be detrimental toward the healthy development of youth."

Well, they just better ban the country of Japan itself. (>.

@Watchmaker163

Regarding the Law of America. The Protect Act of 2003. Copied (lovingly) from Wikipedia.

Prohibits drawings, sculptures, and pictures of such drawings and sculptures depicting minors in actions or situations that meet the Miller test of being obscene, OR are engaged in sex acts that are deemed to meet the same obscene condition. The law does not explicitly state that images of fictional beings who appear to be under 18 engaged in sexual acts that are not deemed to be obscene are rendered illegal in and of their own condition (illustration of sex of fictional minors).

What is the Miller Test?

The Miller test was developed in the 1973 case Miller v. California. It has three parts:
1. Whether "the average person, applying contemporary community standards", would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest,
2. Whether the work depicts/describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law,
3. Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.
The work is considered obscene only if all three conditions are satisfied.

Personally, this sounds EXTREMELY subjective to me. It also seems that, regarding simulated child pornography, the first TWO of the three conditions are already satisfied (depending upon what "average person" we are talking about). This means that if someone decides that a certain bit of loli lacks "serious value," persons possessing it are suddenly holding something illegal.
Of course, I am getting my information from Wikipedia. It's not like I have studied this very hard, yet my understanding of it makes it seem worrisome.

Yeah, and the Japanese bill ain't gonna pass.

I forgot to mention how much I love the way topics such as these seem to polarize every community. It makes me sad. On a brighter and lighter note, I would like to wish everyone here a Happy Turkey Day...tomorrow.

@Cybernetic Seaweed

Happy Turkey Day to you as well!

The thing I didn't say but was trying to is that the Miller test is what is used by the Supreme Court to decide "obscenity" (which is actually better than the previous English-influenced Hicklin test, which did not require the context of the supposed obscene material to be considered. It also did not consider the "average" person, but rather if a more sensitive person had a problem with something, it could be considered obscene). The Supreme Court doesn't make laws, they just interpret them after the fact.

Also, your post above has this statement:

"The law does not explicitly state that images of fictional beings who appear to be under 18 engaged in sexual acts that are not deemed to be obscene are rendered illegal in and of their own condition (illustration of sex of fictional minors). "

Which is saying that depicting minor fictional beings engaged in sexual acts that are not obscene is not automatically illegal, which is a good thing! Plus, by using the Miller Test, it is actually pretty hard to show that a piece of such nature has absolutely zip zilch zero nada redeeming value.

On another note, I don't think this kind of thing polarizes us at all. I think we're all united on the same side of this issue, but we all don't have the same exact opinions =)

Bleh, they want to be the regulators for everything so they can extort money to get products to market. This is yet another unneccesary law, they should be worrying about things like pachinko parlor addictions, a negative birth rate, an aging population with a decaying economy. Seriously, I think the one thing they'd want to do is encourage people to go have kids in any way they possibly can. At this rate they won't have anyone working and they'll end up aging into nonexistance. Other than that, Happy Thanksgiving everyone!