No that title is not click bait, but damn do I wish it was. This post relates all the way back to a post I made in February, you know the one about Senator Stirling Griff? Well the saga of the Australian Government’s war on anime and manga has continued on unnoticed by many, even I must admit I was caught of guard by the latest update on the whole mess.
On October 14th, 2020 popular anime merch and other Japanese products website J-list made an announcement to their Australian customers.
DHL Japan called us last week, informing us that Australian customs have started rejecting packages containing any adult product. They then advised us to stop sending adult products to the country. Following that, current Australian orders with adult items in them were returned to us this week. The full post can be read here.
This means that as of right now, Australian’s can no longer order 18+ items from J-list whether they depict loli or adult characters. Now banning the stuff based on under age characters I can understand to a certain point. Though I do not personally agree with the law as previously stated countless times on this blog, if the drawn character is clearly under age then it is child porn, which is bad. Even though logically a drawing is not a victim. With that logic you could argue that every lewd image ever drawn is bad because the ‘character’ did not give consent.
Let’s say if right now I wanted to buy the Dramatical Murder figure in the image below, I am using this as an example because this is a figure that has been on my Wishlist for years now. Right now I’m not even sure if I bought it if I could legally bring it into the country.
It is only a matter of time at this point as to whether or not they will start banning various yaoi titles for release in Australia. The No Game No Life light novels have already banned and at this point I am not even sure for how long I will be able to actually legally buy manga volumes of the genre I love so much, I mean let’s face it the content is something like say Yarichin Bitch Club is a lot more lewd than No Game No Life. That being said, the ban of the light novel is not going to make me stop loving the series.
I’m a yaoi fan who loves yaoi, Oriemo, Eromanga Sensei and No Game No Life. I will always love what I love because I am not hurting anyone with my hobbies. I am not corrupting the youth of the nation and I a consenting adult who works hard every day and enjoys relaxing with some anime and manga and I have to ask what is so fucking wrong about that?
Yaoi Playground 
In the US, a drawing of a minor is not currently considered porn. Only images using live models are porn. There are some states that may try to extend that to drawings now that the Supreme Court has taken a decidedly more conservative turn.
And maybe you don’t think sexual images of children – even if they are drawings – ought to be out there which is fair enough. But porn is in the eye of the beholder and some people have a very broad view of what constitutes porn. And it won’t just be images of children, it will be images of anyone you could interpret as being under 18.
The US culture wars will be affecting anime in the US and impacting the whole world.
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