Erotic Manga to be Banned?

I question either the source or the mentality of that man.

Yes, the publication being referred to here is obviously quite biased as well, but I don't think they've ever forged a quote.

A pro-ban politician has outraged manga fans by publicly exposing and then ridiculing a BL mangaka who put her name to an anti-ban petition sent to him.

BL mangaka Eiki Eiki, coincidentally the granddaughter of former PM Noboru Takeshita and the big sister of singer Daigo, apparently put her name to a petition opposing the recently passed restrictions on the sale of “unhealthy” anime and manga.

The petition was presented to LDP Tokyo metropolitan assemblyman Masatsugu Mihara, a vocal advocate of the ban, who of course completely ignored it, having previously dismissed all such opposition as “meaningless.”

However, rather than leave it at that he proceeded to all but identify Eiki by name on his site, ridiculing her and suggesting she should be careful what she writes lest her grandfather see it:

    “I received a lot of objections to the revision, but what caught my eye was this next one.

    A lady calling herself the granddaughter of former Prime Minister Takeshita wrote to me, and she writes manga so she didn’t want any increased censorship.

    The last thing I said to her was ‘Would you show these extreme manga to you grandpa [the former PM]? Write your manga using your own judgement as to whether your grandpa would be angry.’”

His crude remarks to the mangaka and his exposure of her identity on his website soon caused outrage amongst manga fans, and before long his homepage, and the offending remarks, mysteriously disappeared.

When the previous rejected version of the ban was being criticised in June, he obliquely accused ban opponents of attacking his offices (naturally the entry has also since disappeared):

    “I got a call saying my office had been done over. I hurried over there and there was a fist-sized hole in the front window, and lots of glass and a stone inside.

    The police asked if I knew anything about it, but neither me nor my secretary had any idea.

    However, I did have one doubt. When the revised youth health ordinance was being deliberated, I was for it and received a lot of letters, calls and comments on my homepage about it.

    Lately it escalated and I’ve been getting a lot of meaningless objections saying ‘I won’t support the LDP any more.’

    Withdrawing support is the most pressure anyone can apply to a politician, it doesn’t get much worse than that. Surely, it couldn’t have escalated further…

    I’ve been a politician for 17 years now. This is the first sort of pressure of this sort I’ve seen. However, I will pursue righteousness. I absolutely will triumph in the end!!”

Critics point out that the “Sanya” area of Tokyo he reports the incident occurring in is already notoriously rough.

The message from ban proponents has consistently been that they will ignore any complaints or petitions, and even industry pleas for negotiation, all in the absence of any popular demand for a ban with national consequences – so much for Japanese democracy.

The part that hit me is the whole mentioning of those who oppose the ban . . .

Agreed! It seems to me that the Japanese government really found the time to strike, man. Enough mamsy-pamsy shit, let's go after the rights of the people. It sounded like a taunt when the dude said that revoking support is the gravest pressure you can apply to a politician. It's like he was really saying "is that all you got, wussy?" Fuck them and fuck him and fuck government in general. I predict that unless the japanese really do something fast, their government will become an imperialist regime that sucks the dignity out of the peoples' lives. It starts small, like this, or letting the government monitor your communications. Dammit, it's happening everywhere.

On a happier note:

Sometimes rape porn totally does it for me.

Also what about people who watch rapey porn to imagine being the victim? It's like that scenario is being totally overlooked.

I find that hot, somehow... /shame

Woulda been creepy if someone we didn't know better about had said that, but when I read it from Moos I just lol'd.

*snicker*

A few days after it stood by as the anime industry was humiliatingly singled out for a ban, the Japanese government is now announcing a plan to quadruple anime and game exports.

Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, historically notorious for interfering with any industry it thinks it can run better than the private sector, has decreed that as part of its “Cool Japan” strategy the nation’s content industries will increase their exports fourfold by 2020.

The very cool sounding “Cool Japan Public-Private Advisory Council” is looking to oversee an increase in “cultural” exports (singling out content industries such as anime and games, as well as fashion and food) of between 2 to 4 times, to as much as 200 billion dollars from the current 50 billion. It expects anime, games and so forth to account for some 35 billion dollars of this total.

It estimates the total size of the global market for such “cultural” goods will double in the same period, to 11 trillion dollars.

The scheme would see affected industries forced to endure “public-private partnerships” (i.e. businesses doing what civil servants tell them to, or else) in pursuit of growth, a strategy which has been the cornerstone of Japanese industrial policy in the post-war period, with mixed results – most notably, the ministry’s predecessor actually tried to stop Sony from producing electronics and Honda from producing cars.

Successful animation, comic and gaming industries are of course not known for state involvement – quite the contrary in fact.

Having Japan’s incompetent yet depressingly numerous civil servants and politicians try to take over the anime and game industries may in fact be the last thing they need, particularly with the state’s main interest in these industries so far being nothing but a series of efforts to ban and censor them, or bully them into “voluntary restraints.”

Coming just after the publishing industry was subjected to humiliating treatment at the hands of Tokyo’s government, it does seem likely that the ministry will find the industry less than welcoming at this stage – and what better way to start the plan off than by the cancellation of the Tokyo International Anime Fair?

I dunno of the meaning of half, but I have a bad feeling of this.

If the current trend of Nihon politics goes forward as it looks now, Japan is going to turn itself into a version of any other communist state, like North Korea or China. It grieves me that a beautiful country like Japan would do this to itself, just as it grieves me that Amerca has turned out like it has. It will only get worse unless the populations of our countries do something about it, but I see Japan moving at an accelerated rate, straight into the toilet.

This sort of manga will always be here. Honestly, if the parents of the kid are okay with the hentai, it should be fine. But if the parents don't know about it, let the parents deal with the kid.

This sort of manga will always be here. Honestly, if the parents of the kid are okay with the hentai, it should be fine. But if the parents don't know about it, let the parents deal with the kid.

You didn't read any of it did you.

2ch’s reaction to fansubbers who excuse their illegal acts by saying they are “supporting the anime industry” and blame the situation on the industry for not providing anime quickly enough is to denounce them for their brazen hypocrisy.

A Japanese journalist attending Anime Expo 2010, held in Los Angeles, had the misfortune to meet a group of fansubbers at the event and writes about the encounter for Nikkei:

    I approached a pair of well known LA-based fansubbers at the event.

    They explained some of their reasoning:

    “We don’t like having to wait to get our anime, and the companies here won’t do it quickly enough. But we can do it.

    By providing anime with no time lag, we’re supporting the American anime market. Even if it is illegal.

    The current state of the American anime market is definitely not good for anime consumers. The companies won’t change it, so we do it for them.”

    After speaking with the fansubbers, I spoke to a Japanese researcher with the Harvard Business School, who was accompanying me. What he murmured to me left an impression:

    “Those kids were cheeky, weren’t they?”

    He was smiling as he said it, but his eyes weren’t smiling…

    As I explained previously, “fansubs” are the main way of viewing anime in America. From a purely legal perspective, fansubbing is nothing more than another way of saying piracy.

    Many have said that fansubs are behind much of the sudden collapse of the American anime market. Naturally many copyright holders want a crackdown.

    It’s often said that fansubbers just do it for love of anime or because they want to promote anime. Opinion tends to be divided as to whether that is the case, or whether they are simple hypocrites making excuses for themselves.

    However, it is clear that they do not think adequate access to anime is being provided by the industry.

He goes on to describe some of the grey areas fansubbing encompasses, where anime producers historically provided only illegal, inferior or impractical access to their products overseas, with the result that consumers took matters into their own hands in what he regards as a very American display of initiative.

After being presented with the article, 2ch is less than convinced by their excuses:

    “Just a bunch of pirates trying to justify their crimes.”

    “Summary: ‘We’re not thieves. We just like anime. We won’t watch it if we have to pay.’”

    “Sounds like something some idiots would say in order to rationalise what they’re doing. I hope these morons get arrested, especially in Japan.”

    “Pirate logic is the same the world over.”

    “They pretend to be gods by freely watching and redistributing the anime Japanese actually buy and support…”

    “If Japan treated Disney cartoons and Hollywood movies like they treated our anime, the US government would go ballistic!”

    “What are they on about? ‘The American anime market,’ ‘American anime consumers’ – when they just illegally pirate everything, is there a ‘market’? Are they ‘consumers’?”

    “With YouTube and similar, Japanese anime sales overseas have dropped off and it’s barely commerically viable anymore.”

    “They should really crack down on these people like Disney does. Why on earth don’t they?”

    “It’s also true that without fansubs anime wouldn’t have spread overseas like it did. And there are a lot of people like this in Japan itself.”

    “The translation abilities of fansubbers are so pitiful it’s a wonder anyone thinks they can form a valid opinion of an anime by watching them.”

    “Even in Japan there are scumbags who sub western films and then upload them, and get treated like gods for doing it.”

    “They refuse to learn Japanese – just look at all the Japanese who learn English to watch their films. What spoilt brats.”

    “Some of these guys also claim to be doing it to advertise the anime in question.”

    “Just cracking down may not increase their revenues in any case. Perhaps they should loosen their grip and let even more people see them.”

    “So you’re an anime producer, are you?”

    “What are you, deluded?”

    “This is just what you’d expect of people who are satisfied with the video quality you get with fansubs.”

    “Having these people watch our anime might encourage more censorship. It would be best if they didn’t watch them.”

    “It’s the industry’s own fault. They should have a Disney-style copyright protection effort.”

    “What really pisses me off is when weekly manga are scanned and translated even before you can buy it in the shops here.”

    “Japanese regional anime otaku: ‘The regional stations are to blame for not broadcasting any anime! We have to use video sharing sites, it’s our last resort!’

    Me: ‘What about ATX?’ [a premium anime channel available nation-wide]

    Natives: ‘…’”

    “Take a leaf out of my book you hairy foreigners! I waited for the Japanese release of ‘Transformers’ without watching it illegally, I went to the US to buy goods despite not speaking a lick of English, I attended the events and bought stuff! Those people have no right to say they love anime.”

    “Leaving aside the matter of overseas otaku, I just want to say to them to stop circulating anime online before you can even buy or watch it in Kanto…”

    “What a bunch of asses. Download all the doujinshi you want, but leave stuff by pros alone.”

    “I can’t say what these people are doing is justified, but I do think the producers who ignore the demand here have really wasted an opportunity.”

    “Just buy the DVDs! Otherwise wait! Or else make something yourself, if you can…”

    “They think they are entitled to watch it all for free now, so they won’t buy anything. Do they think this stuff is produced by some sort of natural process!?”

    “Well, it’s sad but most of them just don’t want to watch the anime enough to actually pay for it to be made.”

    “Even without having a fee system, they can still make something by advertising on the videos, can’t they? It’s not a huge effort for the producers to sub and provide official versions of their anime with minimal lag. It’s better than just having everyone watch them for nothing.”

    “I think some companies already went bust trying that.”

    “As things are now the Americans probably don’t want to buy much advertising.”

    “Those Americans won’t buy anything. It doesn’t matter how many fans there are.

    Look at the prices on the NA editions! It’s that cheap and they still won’t buy it!? It’d be a bargain sale price in Japan.”

    “I get the feeling that it is just us who are paying a lot more.”

    “2 episodes for $70 is Japan only, yes.”

    “The director of Code Geass said in an interview that at US prices 70% of anime titles released in Japan would lose money.

    Just because you sell at a very low price doesn’t mean your sales will necessarily increase a huge amount.

    There simply are not many otaku to sell to in any case. Hollywood films just sell to millions of people so they can spread the cost over them all like that.

    Even at ¥980, this season’s crop of moe anime would never sell 100,000 copies. US prices for anime are from half to a tenth of what we pay – but the market is still collapsing.”

    “If you don’t broadcast and release DVDs simultaneously in all countries, your sales will continue to decrease. In a world connected by the Internet, popularity arises simultaneously, globally.

    If you try to force people to wait a year for something to be localised, it will long since have fallen from popularity by then.”

    “So far they have been saying this:

    ‘Japanese must distribute anime freely at the same time as it airs in Japan – if they don’t, fansubbing will continue forever.’

    So some Japanese makers tried to accommodate them even with their meagre budgets.

    They distributed the Tower of Druaga free on YouTube.

    What happened? The fansubbers ripped off the subs and began distributing their own version in higher resolution.

    Ore no Imouto was also being simulcast in the US.

    What happened? The show was leaked online before it even aired, and then redistributed and they hastily cancelled the whole thing.

    They try to make out as if they are benevolent volunteers. But really their morals are completely absent.”

    “And they do make money from this in spite of it being a ‘volunteer effort.’ They are happy to accept donations – it doesn’t matter how hard the creators work on it, the praise and the money ends up with them in the end.

    And let’s not forget a certain site which targeted Japanese anime, pirated them and distributed them online for free, then became a multimillion dollar enterprise – Crunchy Roll, started by a Chinese-American.”

    “What the idyllic legend of fansubbers starting an overseas market for anime refers to is a bunch of students handing around translated VHS tapes and showing them at their universities.

    But that has nothing to do with the situation now, where ‘anime = download for free’ and the market is collapsing.”

    “In a little while this thread will be translated and made into an article on some foreign site, and they’ll leave out the inconvenient stuff above and just start a huge flamefest.”

Both sides are hypocrites . . . whoever these fansubbers guys are who said that, they surely make it look like as if we're some kind of producers or companies selling & promoting anime or something, which we're not; as for 2Chan, just a bunch of Nazi-hypocrites who seriously needs to get themselves a life.

Not content with a devastating boycott of the Tokyo International Anime Fair, the anime industry has announced it will be holding a new event, the “Anime Contents Expo,” on the very same day as TAF and in neighbouring Chiba’s Makuhari Messe.

The Kadokawa-led alliance of publishers and mangaka who initiated the boycott of TAF in disgust at the Tokyo government’s mistreatment of their industry seem to have sealed the fate of TAF for good:

    As a result of of our opposition to the new restrictions, our group was most regrettably forced to withdraw our participation from the Tokyo International Anime Fair, the committee chairman of which happens to be Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara.

    However, we are most grateful to for the esteemed services of the Association of Japanese Animations in organising the event to date, as it has been exceedingly well received.

    On the other hand, we must consider the needs of fans anticipating the fair, and the necessity of a place in which to unveil all the new titles of spring and summer.

    As a result, we have settled upon a new event and a venue which should be spacious and convenient enough for all fans to attend – this event will be known as the “Anime Contents Expo.”

The event is to be held at Chiba’s massive Makuhari Messe convention centre, on the 26th and 27th of March.

By some extraordinary coincidence, these dates happen to be the same as those of the Tokyo Anime Fair.

The TAF organisers have so far expressed doubts over the future of the event, but have not cancelled it just yet – with no major anime or manga producers participating and another event mysteriously being held on the same dates, it seems rather unlikely they will get the 140,000 visitors they brag about.

messe-aerial.jpg

The Makuhari Messe itself is Japan’s second largest convention centre, with Tokyo Big Sight (best known as the venue for Comiket) being less than 10% larger, so it seems both events will be similar in maximum attendance.

Chiba itself is not necessarily politically safe ground for the industry, but the options in the Kanto region around Tokyo are quite limited for events of any great size – Yokohama is run by an admiring disciple of Ishihara and has a centre only 20% of the size of of Big Sight, and nearby Saitama is very pro-anime but has no large convention centre either.

Further afield, Osaka has a centre on par with Big Sight, but is also stuck with a governor who has already copied and passed Tokyo’s ban. Nagoya has a cosplaying mayor and a convention centre almost half the size of Big Sight, which may yet prove useful if Chiba decides to bite the hand that feeds it.

Thus it would seem the Ishihara-induced anime exodus out of Tokyo has begun – it seems unlikely they will be able to return until Ishihara is out of office, which may be some time in coming considering that the people of Tokyo have in their great wisdom elected him to the office three times already.

Discuss ~

This is the first good news I've seen in this story so far. Maybe the Japanese artists are going to turn this around after all; at  least they aren't silent.

Wow, lol.  I guess I'm an abnormal pervert, then.  =[  Seriously though..people are going to commit sex crimes with hentai and porn, or without.  There was actually this documentary about porn I watched a while back, where they took a poll, and in it was said that without porn, 33% of men would be more inclined to commit a sex crime.  I mean, come on now.  Old people need to gtfo of positions in power, lmao.

Wasn't this just a ban on lolita hentai? Also this is ironic coming from the country that also set the world record for largest orgy.... just saying lol.

Edit: Damn, first post in forever and I forget to look at the friggen date. *facepalm*

Tsuno's first post back and it's in this topic.
Why am I not surprised?

I'm sure nobody's surprised.

lol.

Couldn't help myself.

can we let this thread die please.

:locked: