October 12, 2010
Published: 25 Jul 10 11:14 CET | Double click on a word to get a translation
Online: http://www.thelocal.se/27984/20100725/
A Swedish translator of Japanese manga comics has been fined by Uppsala district court for possession of drawings depicting children engaged in sexual acts.
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Religion is a belief, it is related to ideology, it is only a dogma that can be totally fake. Nobody can.
Chid pornography is a crime! OMG, I am scared of your comment, how can you really say this?
A couple of days ago, btw, I was actually watching a tv show about Japan and how they have legal erotic child movies, with simulated sex, Couldn't understand how nobody in the world would put a stop to that.
It is good to hear that someone is concerned about the children.
But if I were to see cartoons (example: Bart Simpson) having sex or in a sexually suggestive position, I would laugh and should not be charged with viewing child porn... because thats just absurd.
While I do agree that from all the people who view actual child porn, some will want to go ahead and try it out and thus that endangers children,In this case what was the translator going to do? buy a giant float of Mickey mouse and hump it? NO cartoons will be hurt in the production of THAT movie.
It makes no sense and I'm betting this law was passed at a time just to get more votes from moron voters.
Ha-ha! Common sense goes out the window when children are involved. People lose all sense of proportion.
See glamelixir's OMG for an illustration.
I can't agree with you. There is a huge difference betwean a real photography(and all those action before you can do it) and drawing. If someone can draw that kind of stuff, it doesn't mean that he likes it. There are people who get paid for theyr skills, so they do that for living and beleave me there is no moral difference betwean drawing an all killing vampire or serial killer or children related stories. If you want I can personally draw that kind of stuff and send to you and to some public sites, and dont be afraid to take responcibility of that because I know differences betwean photography and drawings.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/artblog/2007/jun/05/howlisasimpsontooktheolym
And if you look at the logo, you have possibly committed the crime of viewing child porn according to UK law.
Honestly, is this how demented, we, as a society are?
(Google is your friend!)
http://www.google.se/#hl=en&q=olympics+logo+lisa+simpson
Ehhh... WHAT?
I don't really understand the point of your comment.... and how it is directed or related to mine... don't know if you missunderstood something or if it is your lack of skills in english... ehhhh..mmm.. what?????? Whatever, no thank you, I don't want you to send me anything....or get in touch with me in any kind of way.
take legal actions against this guy for downloading (not drawing and distributing) some sicko comics but as of a year ago collect, preserve, and distribute actual child porn in the national library!
Swedish national library reported for child porn
http://www.thelocal.se/18704/20090406/
Swedish national library in child porn scandal
http://www.thelocal.se/17058/20090121/
Sometimes it's quite difficult for me to express my opinion through writing, so I will try again.
''No you can not draw anything related to child pornography to sell it becaues you are engouraging it!!! You can't compare religion to child porn!''
Yes I can if I want. Because I draw and no actual child is harmed.
(If I can't draw what I want, then welcome to the end of democracy, the same with writing, talking and expressing yourself in general)
I am not sure about encouraging, because there are a lot of different types of media( movies, comics, even books) where fiction people commit crimes such as murder, robbery, cheat and etc. and it doesn't mean, that people after watching a movie o reading o comic book will go and act like that.
That's the main point I can't understand, why some types of behavior are allowed to show in media and some types not.
''Whatever, no thank you, I don't want you to send me anything....or get in touch with me in any kind of way. ''
I am not going to send you anything . I just wanted to say, that if I draw, it doesn't mean that I am encourage someone to act against the law nor that I like what I draw.
And this particular case, when translator was fined for possesing that kind of comics is absurd. On the other side it would be absolutely ok to send him to jail if he was possesing photos of children pornography
Well...I'm no lawyer but it seems that's not an acceptable argument in modern society. Say I light up a joint in my garden...I'm not harming anybody but myself, and yet the cops could come and bust me.
I don't know at which turn the world has gone crazy, but I think it's the relics of religion. Let's not forget that gay people were persecuted not too long ago (and still are to a lesser extent).
The judge who made this decision needs to go. In fact, anyone who's been wasting taxpayer money to prosecute a cartoon (however sick it may be) has to be fired for not using common sense. Not holding my breath though...
I think it's a little bit different, because that kind of action has deeper consequenses. If you buy weed, it means , that you support criminal word, you can become a drug addict and after that you would be very expencive for goverment(police, anti drug programs and etc.) , but these are only variations, because you can also grow weed by yourself and try to smoke it one time in your life without bigger consequenses..
''In fact, anyone who's been wasting taxpayer money to prosecute a cartoon ''
It seems that's true..
Absolutely not!
it's only different if you view cannabis as something criminal. If you were to view hentai as criminal, then its possession supports the "criminal" world, and you can potentially become a sex addict and be very expensive for the government.
See...if you believe the "gateway drug" principle, then surely you must be able to see how the same reasoning can be applied to cartoons of kids having sex, and how owning hentai can potentially lead a person to become a child molester. And this stupid "gateway" reasoning (be it applied to cannabis or hentai) is the core issue in both cases. And it's bs in both cases. Cartoons don't lead to abusing children anymore than cannabis leads to shooting heroin!
The laws in this society are inconsistent. You just can't see it because your views have been shaped by propaganda.
And just to be clear, I neither smoke herb nor watch porn cartoons.
Now I got your point althought I don't fully agree with your statement.
I neither smoke nor watch porn cartoons too, I have a life:)
It will be interesting to hear the decision of the court.
@doberman: Try to think this way: Those who like to watch cartoons of children having sex are sick. Those who draw those cartoons CATER to those sickos, not to mention they, too, are sick. So, to make my point even clearer, I would like to sh#t on the freedom of such expression.
P.S. I also sh#t on Pokemon, Bakugan and any other stupid japanese cartoon. I with they get banned from showing in Sweden.
Ok, first of all, lets make one thing clear. I hope you DO realize that most of these pictures, maybe even all of them, are pictures of girls that look like they are like 14-18 years old. Right, so you are saying its SICK to feel attracted to the body of a 16 year old girl? No its not, its NORMAL. Here, let me spell it out for you one more time: NORMAL. And since NO girls are getting harmed in any way its ridiculous that legal action has to be taken against this harmless man.
And oh, even if it is girls that look like they are 10 years old, thats still not sick. Pedophiles cant help that they are attracted to kids, its not their fault. Implying that these people are sick is the same thing as saying that homosexuals are sick. Because I hope you can understand that being a pedophile is not the same thing as being a rapist. So then, please tell where the harm is in watching sexual drawings of kids. Who is getting hurt? Now please tell me, Im dying to know!
I think it's disgusting that this translator was fined for downloading DRAWINGS. Even if the law in question used to prosecute the translator was meant to protect children in general, that means REAL CHILDREN, not imaginary characters who happen to vaguely resemble children (manga drawings don't even look like real people).
It's also bizarre that people in such a conservative society like Japan can fantasize in freedom but people in the so-called 'sexually liberated' Sweden are subject to thought police. Is it really 2010?
Well, as has come up already, cannabis is still illegal and not tolerated by the law in Sweden despite never killing anyone and despite the gateway drug theory being disproved by scientists... so I guess we can't expect logic to prevail when it comes to moral panics without base in reality.
And to add another cannabis metaphor here I would say that this is more like if someone drew a picture of a joint and then someone else downloaded that picture online and got fined for downloading 'drug paraphernilia'... the ridiculousness of that scenario should show the ridiculousness of the scenario in this news item.
Should everyone who read Nabokov's Lolita also be charged with a criminal offense?
What is really appalling, is that other countries, like the U.K., have followed Sweden's example on this law and instead of laughing such proposals out of parliament, have passed a very similar law here. Now U.K. citizens can be convicted of exercising bad taste, in private, a "crime" which harms no one, but apparently must be punished "for the sake of the (cartoon) children".
In my opinion, any judge that willingly goes along with this law is a moral coward and does not deserve their position of authority and trust.
are mentally healthy people, according me they are in need of professional help. Send me some pictures by you known children and I paint some unforgettable mangas which you can hang up on the wall... For me this is not an issue about moral...I only want to get rid of some millions of dirty minds,mostly guys, impossible to be cured.
The kids on the pictures you mentioned, are they supposed to be naked and presented in a sexual way or not? And on your manga, can you recognize the real kids the drawing depicts? If the answer is yes on any of them, then you are committing a crime and fall into the category of those who require professional help.
"Maybe in your reality the people who like pictures as http://img10.hostingpics.net/pics/334607lolicon_hentai.jpg
are mentally healthy people, according me they are in need of professional help."
Haha, you dont say huh. Are homosexuals also people in need of professional help? Im just curious of what you think.
We also have to factor into the equation that many western people, unfamiliar with manga, might assume most of the faces drawn there are of children, when those who know the genre are well aware that is not the case at all. so, although in this case they might have been images meant to be children, it still endangers others, a much, much larger group, who view manga images not meant to be children.
Whatever your viewpoint on the above, how can it be right that the state can punish an individual when the state cannot show credible evidence that the individual has caused or is even in danger of causing harm? Laws like this are true "thought crimes", they punish people for what the lawmakers think they are thinking.
I am against censorship. And regarding this case lets give an example:
A cartoon or manga author makes a piece of art. So (s)he creates a story which of course contains dramatic scenes. Now what makes something dramatic in the eye of the reader? Something which will touch them emotionally in a strong way. Incidentally this is also the kind of stuff some people try to outlaw. So here this author may come up with a scene where a "cute little innocent child" is brutally raped by some "bad guy".
What can this author do? Make the art and hide it (still criminal according to such laws) or get thrown into prison. Or dont make the art at all. Or somehow water it down (like not showing the scene even if that is inconsistent with the style). But then its compromised, is not really art anymore.
"For me this is not an issue about moral...I only want to get rid of some millions of dirty minds,mostly guys, impossible to be cured."
I only want to get rid of some millions of evil(*) minds, mostly humans, dont know if they can be cured.
(*) Those that dont care about morals and take it upon themselves to dictate what others may think and take it upon themselves to decide what is "dirty".