Tokyo's "Anti-Anime" Bill Sparks Convention Wars
- Thread starter John Funk
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Damn do I love all of the people who miss the entire problem with such a loosely worded bill. They may as well say, "Good for California banning any violent game image they can, or suggestion of violence, while Hollywood keeps producing multi-million dollar gore-fests."
I know it's been explained several times, but it appears that it STILL bears repeating. The issue here isn't sexualization of minors. It's allowing anything that may even slightly cause issue with a person more prude than a puritan being banned, and then there's the issue of regulating some mediums while allowing others to remain unaffected. There's also the more theoretical issue of art and censorship.
EDIT: And to the people who laugh at people for worrying about the "what-ifs" versus real enactment, you have to remember, all it takes is one person to go to far with a law that allows them to do so. Yes, some of it may be alarmist, but even without probability on its side, possibility will always lurk in the shadows.
I know it's been explained several times, but it appears that it STILL bears repeating. The issue here isn't sexualization of minors. It's allowing anything that may even slightly cause issue with a person more prude than a puritan being banned, and then there's the issue of regulating some mediums while allowing others to remain unaffected. There's also the more theoretical issue of art and censorship.
EDIT: And to the people who laugh at people for worrying about the "what-ifs" versus real enactment, you have to remember, all it takes is one person to go to far with a law that allows them to do so. Yes, some of it may be alarmist, but even without probability on its side, possibility will always lurk in the shadows.
I agree with most of your comments on this, but until the 'could' in your sentence turns into a 'does' I will not be convinced that legislation is needed. It is the same shaky foundation that the people who are trying to ban computer games are using and it just does not add up.UberNoodle said:
If that logic worked, as I said early in the thread, movies such as Saw would need to be banned as they glorify murder and anyone watching / enjoying those movies are just closet murderers. It is logic that does not work in the real world.
Before making legislation like this people should look at what is happening in the real world. Was there an increase in the sexual abuse of children when the internet brought lolicon to peoples desktops. Since surely if the logic hold water then we should be able to see the effect at work in the real world.
Unfortunately I cannot find any stats about this but it would not surprise me if the amount of sexual abuse to real children is decreasing rather than going up. Of course the stats about pedophiles being convicted is exploding due to the goal posts of what a pedophile is constantly being moved by new laws to included people who look at drawings etc. But I will always care purely about the end result of all this legislation, which is how many real children are being abused....
I know why this untested logic has come about. Whenever someone does touch a kid, a lot of the time when the police arrest them (and hopefully give them a couple of sneaky kicks in the head in the process) they find child or loli porn on their computers. So the logic grows that child / loli porn on the computer = pedophile. But how about if we used the same logic elsewhere. I am sure every time they go to the house of a suicide bomber they find a Koran. So therefore the Koran must = Suicide bomber, which of course we all know is stupid... right?
This.Red-Link said:
Honestly, I don't think this law will change much, but that's not really the point. Ishihara is the one appointing the panel of censors/assessors. If he wanted to turn the whole thing into an extortion racket, he could. He's already known to be a racist, sexist, bigoted asshat, and the fact that he deliberately worded the bill so it didn't affect his shitty novels or the work of his buddies in TV production just underline that he's willing to take the piss with legislation. Legislation that I'd remind you the rest of the government decided to pass. In light of that, claiming that there's no need to worry unduly about the government misusing legislation is frankly laughable. I can't think of ANY series I've ever watched that these guys couldn't give the 18+ stamp to if they were determined, and that includes Aria and Hidamari Sketch. (Well. Maybe not Akiba-chan, but that's a kids' puppet show. Stop looking at me like that.) He isn't trying to 'clean up' anime. He's trying to marginalize otaku culture even further, because his voting lure is basically: 'everything is the fault of foreigners and those damn kids, also let's raise pensions'. He's in his third term, it works.
By the way, for all of you complaining about too much trashy fanservice, I'd remind you that the people lapping that stuff up are the biggest pool of profit for the studios. Stop making it, they go broke. It's that simple. Yes, it sucks, but you aren't going to pick up the slack by buying Feito-chan body pillows for eighty bucks a throw. They need that money.
Japan guards its freedom of speech and expression religiously (and good on them!)
It might occasionally allow for such unsavoury things as animated pedophilia and overt racist slurs (although acting out in realityb on either of those ideas wi..may get you jailed), but it prevents the slippery slope erosion of rights almost every country is enduring. Good on you Japan. Keep fighting the good fight. You don't have to become another America.
Plus, the general rule of thumb is that good-for-nothing Ishihara is wrong regardless of whatever he's saying.
It might occasionally allow for such unsavoury things as animated pedophilia and overt racist slurs (although acting out in realityb on either of those ideas wi..may get you jailed), but it prevents the slippery slope erosion of rights almost every country is enduring. Good on you Japan. Keep fighting the good fight. You don't have to become another America.
Plus, the general rule of thumb is that good-for-nothing Ishihara is wrong regardless of whatever he's saying.
The original rationalization behind the child pornography laws was to protect (Real) children. Now they're doing a half-assed attempt at "banning another form" of "child pornography". (It's hard to call something a child if it doesn't technically have an age). I was insulting you for the post being nothing but a (mini) lecture against people who dare to like something you don't. One without valid points, or information. If someone acts like a tard, I reserve the right to insult their intelligence by calling them one.UberNoodle said:
Jonci said:
Shit you're right, I would not want to be the artist of Dance in the Vampire Bund right now
First off please note that not everything I'm saying here is 100% accurate, but rather my understanding of how things are.Ilyak1986 said:
The shows that you're describing, the magical girl animes and teen in giant robot saves world animes, generally fall under different headings than more mature shows. If my understanding is correct, shows tend to be categorized by the crowd they are marketed towards. The shows you described generally fall under the descriptors "shounen" or "shoujou" (not sure about spelling) meaning they are being marketed towards people between the ages of 12 and 20 or there about. More mature shows with philosophically deep messages tend to be labeled as "sannin" which are marketed to people from ages 18-30 or so. Many of the shows mentioned in this topic fall under the "sannin" heading if you're looking to watch something like that. Not to say that there aren't shounens or shoujous with strong philosophical messages, but most of them are intended for younger audiences than those who would watch the daily show.
The idea is a good one, but the implementation is terrible -- especially since there's such a huge, vague gap between something done strictly for the sake of the story and not intending to cross any lines and something done for the sake of titillating the audience in a sexual way. In my opinion it's fine to do the latter if it's for adults (and it doesn't HAVE to be 18+ in nature, mind you), but not fine at all if it is for children.
I think Japan is trying to make that distinction, that some things are fine for adults but not okay for children. I can commend them for that. What I cannot commend them for is being obnoxiously heavy handed about it. It's like my parents when I was a child: I was not allowed to watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles because it was violent and somehow dangerous to my mental state. I don't believe that to be the case, and most people don't believe that to be the case, but with this new law something as harmless as a bit of cleavage could be considered dangerous to impressionable youth. And come on, that's silly.
edit - but oh yeah, making them head to the back room with the hentai and stuff is also just plain silly. Get a good rating system going, Japan, to keep such things your society finds dangerous out of the hands of minors but still reasonably available to those of age. Don't be stupid about it. Do they have a rating system already? Ehh.
I think Japan is trying to make that distinction, that some things are fine for adults but not okay for children. I can commend them for that. What I cannot commend them for is being obnoxiously heavy handed about it. It's like my parents when I was a child: I was not allowed to watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles because it was violent and somehow dangerous to my mental state. I don't believe that to be the case, and most people don't believe that to be the case, but with this new law something as harmless as a bit of cleavage could be considered dangerous to impressionable youth. And come on, that's silly.
edit - but oh yeah, making them head to the back room with the hentai and stuff is also just plain silly. Get a good rating system going, Japan, to keep such things your society finds dangerous out of the hands of minors but still reasonably available to those of age. Don't be stupid about it. Do they have a rating system already? Ehh.
There's always ways around these things. I'm on the rope with this.
I feel Japan needs to mature some of their media a bit. Giggling at school girls in panties is hilarious when I was 12, but as I got older I found some of my once favorite shows becoming childish. I used to adore .hack, and now I find the new series is filled with incestuous tones with 12 year old and the newest all my old favs are pantie clad women getting underwear shots.
However I do not believe that they have the right to take away creative genius. Just because I don't appreciate these scenes doesn't mean someone else doesn't, and it doesn't make it any less art. Also with content that doesn't have any sexual innuendo's being perceived as such.
I feel Japan needs to mature some of their media a bit. Giggling at school girls in panties is hilarious when I was 12, but as I got older I found some of my once favorite shows becoming childish. I used to adore .hack, and now I find the new series is filled with incestuous tones with 12 year old and the newest all my old favs are pantie clad women getting underwear shots.
However I do not believe that they have the right to take away creative genius. Just because I don't appreciate these scenes doesn't mean someone else doesn't, and it doesn't make it any less art. Also with content that doesn't have any sexual innuendo's being perceived as such.
The only problem I have with all of this is what they can censor. The articles says even Sailor Moons transformation can be censored and that has been showed on network TV many times. If there were clear limits set on paper and not just whatever the gov't feels like censoring that day, I think there would far less issues taken.
Anime and Manga are huge throughout the world. I can't imagine Japan wishes to have an industry strike. Right now it has started with crippling the biggest convention in the world for the market, next it will be strike. I would miss my Naruto, Fairy Tales and others but if that's what it took to make it right so be it.
Anime and Manga are huge throughout the world. I can't imagine Japan wishes to have an industry strike. Right now it has started with crippling the biggest convention in the world for the market, next it will be strike. I would miss my Naruto, Fairy Tales and others but if that's what it took to make it right so be it.
I laugh to this day though. I used to watch sailor moon with no issues, who cares if they stripped to get their... battle uniforms on? But I was ignorant to the lesbianism in it with the cousins (hopefully I'm remembering right, it's been a while)
Awesome Cardcaptors. Read the manga when I was very small. Disregarded the fact that most of the females were lesbians and the brother and his friend gay. I didn't care and was too young TO care. I still don't to this day, and yet I was very young when I saw and read them.
I wonder how they are going to react to these kinds of manga's and media that have such content in them but are not damaging, at least not that I see. These children were what, 12 and 16 in the anime and manga? This should be fun.
Awesome Cardcaptors. Read the manga when I was very small. Disregarded the fact that most of the females were lesbians and the brother and his friend gay. I didn't care and was too young TO care. I still don't to this day, and yet I was very young when I saw and read them.
I wonder how they are going to react to these kinds of manga's and media that have such content in them but are not damaging, at least not that I see. These children were what, 12 and 16 in the anime and manga? This should be fun.
So essentially those 10 publishing houses are saying that the mainstream industry needs child nudity to survive?
Jeez if that's the case- maybe they should just shut 'em all down. If you can't survive without putting something like that in your work and passing it off as mainstream stuff, you've got no busines creating mainstream media. Just accept that your work is underground already, and with GOOD reasons.
Jeez if that's the case- maybe they should just shut 'em all down. If you can't survive without putting something like that in your work and passing it off as mainstream stuff, you've got no busines creating mainstream media. Just accept that your work is underground already, and with GOOD reasons.
I think people aren't complaining about the fact that Japan wants to regulate this stuff so much as the vague wording of the bill. Indeed, I doubt anyone here would object to manga depicting rape being withheld from minors, but there's a problem when the language is such that it might also include something like NGE.UberNoodle said:
In any case, I doubt the bill will affect the anime/manga industry even if it goes so far as to label DragonBall as pornography. Since porn here is often sold right next to the shonen section you'd basically only see said manga moving 1-2 feet to the left on the magazine rack. Hardly the "behind the R-18 curtain" doomsday scenario that so many people here are complaining about.