Breaking news from WIRED.

Christopher Handley, described by his lawyer as a “prolific collector” of manga, pleaded guilty last week to mailing obscene matter, and to “possession of obscene visual representations of the sexual abuse of children.” Three other counts were dropped in a plea deal with prosecutors.

Anyone who owns manga should be very afraid of this decision. I had no idea that such a law existed in the U.S.. This has happened in Australia already. The original U.S. law The Child Protect Act was ruled overly broad by the U.S. Supreme court so it apparently was rewritten to use “community standards” to decide if what you possess is Illegal and has not been challenged since I suppose.

Drawings are not real. I can own and draw all the killings I want without being accused or convicted of murder, why is this any different. There are no children involved in this case, no harm has been done to any real person, and there is no way putting Mr. Handley in prison for up to 15 years is going to prevent real child abuse. Please, someone explain to me how this law is going to truly protect children and not just criminalize bad taste.

One Comment Manga,Stuff

One Response to “Thought Crime comes to the U.S.”

  1. Iowa Man Set For Sentencing In Manga "Obscenity" Case | G.A.M.E.S. on 10 Nov 2009 at 1:42 pm #

    [...] Note: This is a follow up to this post. [...]

Trackback URI | Comments RSS

Leave a Reply