Youth ordinance bill 156 passes

[Weeaboo Name]

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2010-12-13/tokyo-youth-ordinance-bill-approved-by-committee

It's all a little vague to be honest, all i can say is a lot of people are unhappy with it, not only the yaoi fangirls, otaku rage is everywhere.

Anyway I shan't be jumping on the rage train until I know how tight the new regulations are and what actually changes.

 

[digi-kun]

The reason it's so vague is cuz it used to say "underage" in that. The used-to-be-loli-ban was rewritten into a full hentai ban because the main argument was "you can't tell what age they are" or something along those lines.

Now from what I hear, it's technically only restricted to Tokyo, but that doesn't mean pretty much every publisher isn't already against this. The fact that a nice chunk of publishers pulled out of the Tokyo International Anime Fair is in light of this. Most of what I see is that all the (major) publishers in Tokyo end up moving out of Tokyo, assuming it doesn't get taken out with all this protest

And to think it all started because one game was accidentally put on American Amazon for a few minutes.

 

[Alice]

I'm not quite sure I understand what this means. What exactly are they banning?

 

[Scarlette]

I'm so confused on this bill. I think it's wrong to tell an artist not that he cannot create what he or she wants to. Some stuff in anime i'm a little touchy about like I really dont like how women are usally protraid but what can u do. I think banning it is gonna make it more interesting to people as always it does.

but my other main concere is the govenor invovled with this Shintaro Ishihara, is one of the worlds worst people in politics. He's called LGBT people abnormal, Said When women outlive their reproductive years that they shouldnt really be alive and are living in sin, Has made racist comments especially about Africans, and African americans and koreans, and also doesnt own up to what japan arm did during the raping of Nanking. Which is one of thr most horrible things ever in history what they did to so many innocent people.

 

[kohei]

Ishihara is full of double-standards, quite frankly.
His novels are far worse than soft porn seen in non-18+ marked manga.
Rape in manga having a bad affect on kids? Gee, wonder what all this rape is doing in your novels, Mr. Shintaro.

"You want your kids watching stuff like this? [referring to anime/manga]" he says.
I sure hope my kids don't go reading your books too.

Also how he disregarded the 1500 messages that opposed the bill, while he accepts the 500 messages that wanted the bill to pass made me question a lot of things, I'll tell you that.

 

[Shanghai Alice]

Japan bans youth pornography.

18+ Lolis are created.

Japan bans depictions of male genitalia.

Tentacle monsters are created.

Kanako help us if this bill passes...

 

[digi-kun]

Huh? It did pass. I guess the OP post forgot to put the follow-up in there, but this is the follow-up news post from that

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2010-12-15/full-tokyo-assembly-passes-youth-ordinance-bill

As for what it's covers...

The current ordinance already prevents the sale and renting of "harmful publications" — materials that are "sexually stimulating, encourages cruelty, and/or may compel suicide or criminal behavior" to people under the age of 18. Bill 156 would require the industry to also regulate "manga, anime, and other images (except for real-life photography)" that "unjustifiably glorify or exaggerate" certain sexual or pseudo sexual acts. Another section of the revised bill would allow the government to directly regulate the above images if the depicted acts are also "considered to be excessively disrupting of social order" such as rape.

 

[Netto Azure]

And to think it all started because one game was accidentally put on American Amazon for a few minutes.

Is that really true? I would really be shocked if that is true.

I remember reading about this in another forum during the summer when it was just the Loli ban so I was surprised to find out how it mutated into this really vague and broad anti-everything law. ._.

Something People Overseas Can Do – Fight Misconceptions about Bill 156 and Japan

^ Great article BTW.

 

[digi-kun]

I didn't mention the name of the title because the name is a bit....bad for the forums, though i guess for information's sake it wouldn't hurt to just put a link up. Though minutes may have been exaggerated.

Please be warned that this link WILL contain mature content, despite being a link to a wiki page.

 

[Mario The World Champion]

I actually heard about this game in CNN one time when the news first broke. I really wasn't in shock and everybody on there condemned the makers of the game for it. Anything containing sex is usually damned by us while something incredibly violent is somewhat passed over. I still remember the firestorm Rockstar Games went through with the "Hot Coffee" mod in GTA: San Andreas.

I got the game as soon as it was released and if I felt like it, I could find the code and use my Gameshark to unlock that mini-game.

 

[J]

One should regulate their own heart before attempting to regulate free speech! There were lolicon far back in the past before there was manga, the Internet, anime! What's important is to have the heart to face those desires and control them instead of trying to put a lid on them!

something like that

it's not a really long way from here to the banning of all "objectionable/inconvenient materials", then to suppression of free thought, to book burnings etc, all in the name of "youth protection"

but enough of this; long live big brother!

 

[Shanghai Alice]

I didn't mention the name of the title because the name is a bit....bad for the forums, though i guess for information's sake it wouldn't hurt to just put a link up. Though minutes may have been exaggerated.

Eh... Oddly enough, I found out about this purely by chance while wiki surfing Superman 64. Long chain of events ensued.


But... yeah. Though people say that that game portrays "a lesser crime", what ticks me off is that it apparently goes extremely in-depth, and makes it really, really, really damn personal.

...that, and if murder was portrayed absolutely realistically in video games, I think we'd have a lot more on our hands...

Then again, it is funny (But understandable) how this causes more controversy than Japanese girls murdering people in brutal, horrible ways in Higurashi.

it's not a really long way from here to the banning of all "objectionable/inconvenient materials", then to suppression of free thought, to book burnings etc, all in the name of "youth protection"

but enough of this; long live big brother!

I'm dignifying this. I don't know why.

But...

A game portraying extremely explicit rape sure as hell should be restricted to minors. I'm not gonna spout the usual BS about how it's too "Mature and sophisticated" (...I honestly hate that argument, actually) for them. The point is, minors shouldn't be exposed to such things.

After all... If you had a 14-year-old child, you'd probably be okay with him watching Band of Brothers, right? That's all well and good, of course.

Now what if that movie was, say...

Okay, so I can't think of any movies glorifying sex and rape ATM, but... you get the point.

[/ArgumentBreakdown]

 

[J]

the problem, as always, resides in human nature.
there wouldn't be a need to ban controversial material and the like if we all had the ability to differentiate between reality and fiction - if we could all tell what is right from what is wrong
then we'd have something like those utopias from antiquity, described by those romantic idealists; a world where fairies dance and pixies prance, and everyone is pretty cool

but we don't live in such a world

our society (subtly) teaches us that all means are justifiable, so long as there's a profit on the other side; that the workplace is more important than the family; that official documents are worth more than a wholehearted promise. it's a society that presumes that humans are evil by nature. it's no surprise that such a society would produce morally bankrupt people.

one of the keys to solving this is moral education (not the zombie-like chanting of confucian scriptures they have nowadays)

huh? what was the topic again?

 

[Shanghai Alice]

the problem, as always, resides in human nature.
there wouldn't be a need to ban controversial material and the like if we all had the ability to differentiate between reality and fiction - if we could all tell what is right from what is wrong
then we'd have something like those utopias from antiquity, described by those romantic idealists; a world where fairies dance and pixies prance, and everyone is pretty cool

but we don't live in such a world

our society (subtly) teaches us that all means are justifiable, so long as there's a profit on the other side; that the workplace is more important than the family; that official documents are worth more than a wholehearted promise. it's a society that presumes that humans are evil by nature. it's no surprise that such a society would produce morally bankrupt people.

one of the keys to solving this is moral education (not the zombie-like chanting of confucian scriptures they have nowadays)

huh? what was the topic again?

Teach what morality? Teach who's morality? What is morality, and does it really exist? How do you know that I want your morality, and that your morality isn't my evil? How do you know I am capable of understanding morality at all? Is Western morality correct? Is Eastern morality correct? Middle Eastern?

Is teaching morality oppressive? Does it stomp out the viewpoints of others? Wouldn't enforcing a single definition of morality run counter to free will, and destroy the point of a democracy? What is a truly moral state? Do the people support their peers? Does the government support the people? Are the crippled given pity jobs, or are they given support simply because they are crippled?

If I do not want to work, is it moral to destroy my free will? Is it immoral to leave me to die because of my own bad decisions? Is it immoral to want to advance? Is it moral to voice your opinions, when others may not want to hear them? Does morality require toleration of the borderline intolerable? Is morality pure abstinence, or is it indulgence that only harms yourself? Is indulgence immoral, or natural?

I could go on for quite a while, but answer those questions first.


While I disagree with many things, I understand that not everyone's "morality" is consistent with my own.

Yes, religions have codified laws, but even those can still be left open to interpretation, if someone really wants to bend them.

We're not in Rousseau's paradise, the government is merely compensating for the fact that morality is not consistent, and it is trying to enforce something which is reasonably fair.

Of course, government isn't perfect, but hey...


I'm not trying to lecture you, by the way. I just have too much free time on my hands, and I'm "just a passing housewife."

 

[Netto Azure]

@Digi: Ah yes, the misconception about the RaepLay game thingy. It only takes ONE slip up to cause people to brand the entire industry as being laden filled with child pr0nz. u_u