Today’s Del Rey Manga newsletter contained a special alert urging fans to support the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund in its efforts to defend a manga collector from federal prosecution for possession of manga that the government claims to be obscene.
Del Rey Marketing manager Ali T. Kokmen sent the newsletter. Here’s some excerpts:
CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein commented, “Handley’s case is deeply troubling, because the government is prosecuting a private collector for possession of art. In the past, CBLDF has had to defend the First Amendment rights of retailers and artists, but never before have we experienced the Federal Government attempting to strip a citizen of his freedom because he owned comic books.”
Putting the case into further context, CBLDF Legal Counsel Burton Joseph said, “In the lengthy time in which I have represented CBLDF and its clients, I have never encountered a situation where criminal prosecution was brought against a private consumer for possession of material for personal use in his own home. This prosecution has profound implications in limiting the First Amendment for art and artists, and comics in particular, that are on the cutting edge of creativity. It misunderstands the nature of avant-garde art in its historical perspective and is a perversion of anti-obscenity laws.”
The case started back in 2006 when Mr. Handley got some manga shipped from Japan and the Postal Inspector took a peek. Shortly afterwards, cops showed up at Handley’s home and searched his extensive collection of 1,200 manga, along with his computers.
Handley’s lawyers scored a major victory earlier this year when a judge found portions of the PROTECT Act unconstitutional. The legalese in question makes it a crime to knowingly produce, distribute, receive, or possess with intent to distribute, “a visual depiction of any kind, including a drawing, cartoon, sculpture, or painting,” that “is, or appears to be” a minor engaged in sexual conduct.
So yes, it would seem we’re talking about loli/shota here.
But Handley isn’t out of hot water yet. He still faces charges for possessing “legally obscene” material. The material cannot be deemed obscene unless it meets all three of the criteria of the Miller test for obscenity: “(a) whether the average person, applying contemporary community standards would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest; (b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and (c) whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.” The jury must answer all three questions in the affirmative in order to convict.
All of this brings up a long standing issue for fans of some of the more, how you say, “sexual” manga and anime coming out of Japan. Anyone who has spent some time in the anime/manga community knows of 4chan and 12chan and such sites that have/had thriving lolicon and shotocon boards. And there’s a hell of a lot of doujinshi sold in Japan with these themes; they’re often very explicit and they often get pirated here in the U.S. and traded on file sharing sites. The question has always been, “is this legal?” In some countries, the answer is a very loud “NO”. Shotacon, for instance, is illegal in Australia, Canada, Sweden, Norway, and South Africa. It’s been on vague legal standing in the U.S., with various laws prohibiting drawn depictions of minors having sex being later proven to be unconstitutional (like the case of Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition).
Granted, hardcore loli and shota are a very niche aspect of a niche market, and one can always logically (and correctly) argue that it’s just ink and cases like Mr. Handley’s are overblown. But this subculture is a radically bad representation of the anime fanbase, which already suffers from a bad public image. The comic and anime fans and members of the industry have fought the good fight in terms of fairness in free speech laws, but in the end we have to really ask ourselves as anime fans, is “barely legal” child pron really something we want our industry to be associated with?
Anyways, Del Rey Manga and other comic organizations have done an admirable job of standing up for a fan who is most likely getting railroaded by morality police. You can learn more about the case, and the Comic Book Legal Defense fund here
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