Loyal Vassal · 15d
Feel free to ignore this! But I was reading ‘The End of Cool Japan,’ and I got to the chapter by Sharalyn Orbaugh about Canadian pornography laws and censorship of certain manga. One thing that stuck out to me in that chapter was the feminist law professor that stated, “children are being abused and you’re worrying about comic books?” Of course, she spends the rest of the paper addressing this, and I think she does a good job. But that leaves me wondering. While obviously lolisho aren’t p3d0philes, and a majority of consumers of this type of fiction aren’t, what if, by it’s propagation, we are fostering an environment in which people are desensitized to it, or people begin to subtlety view children as er0ticized objects..I realize that Canada has banned such depictions in anticipation that it would have harmful effects, for which the jury is still out, but now after 30 years of eromanga being circulated through the internet it has not made a perceptible difference on real life abuse. But still…there is that ‘what if,’ that by enjoying stories of this nature, one might be putting their own entertainment and reading/aesthetic pleasure above the well-being of children, and that it won’t be clear until it’s too late. This possibility disturbs me. Am I wrong for thinking this way? Am I like wayyy overthinking this?
A big part of this sort of argument— “are we fostering an environment where people are desensitized to [sexualizing children]” is like….we already LIVE in a world where the sexualization and exploitation of children is normalized in many ways. Children are basically owned by their parents and guardians and girls are seen as a kind of sexual property that must be “protected” by external influences, look at any comments under viral tiktoks of teenage or tween girls dancing or having fun or of young teen or child actresses and you’ll see grown adults leaving disgusting comments under the guise of jokes or messing around. In short, already no one really needs to be “tricked” into viewing children as sexual objects or objects to exercise abuse and power over, because sadly there’s a lot that already goes on even in modern society. I do think the concern — “are we putting entertainment and reading/aesthetic pleasure above the well-being of children?” Is something normal to think, because it does apply in a lot of Real Life situations sadly. I dont think this kind of speculation specifically about Drawn Art is particularly helpful, since it’s speculating about hypothetical harms (that as you’ve said, have not been proven) when there are many well documented examples of the kinds of conditions and environments that do lead to abuse. It’s not a mysterious “miasma.” (I talked a bit about this in this ask, though that one was more about misogyny.) https://retrospring.net/@tithetohell/a/113213645376771424
I actually do think that media, the way it’s presented and distributed and framed in the public, can contribute to these assumptions, and it’s not a “fiction Never Affects Reality” thing (that idea is stupid on its own) I think there has been discourse and critique in Japan/East Asia about this but I’m not up to date on the scholarship or current writings. However, that to me is less about content itself and more about the unbalanced power in what is framed as “reality,” which I agree does need to be undertaken with responsibility. I think this is where a lot of the feminist critique comes in, when it comes to “harmful” fantasies and depictions of women—it’s fine to have crazy fantasies, normal even, but overwhelmingly men’s fantasies get treated and presented as Real Normal Facts of Desirability(about women, girls, children, etc) in media, and that’s what is dangerous and frustrating.
I just also think that legal censorship is always more harmful than it is helpful, and especially for purely artistic purely fictional works always ends up harming those who are most vulnerable, and also is just absolutely impossible to enforce in a fair way. There will always be a double standard of who gets to be successful, vs who will get absolutely pilloried for their problematic work.
For my purely personal opinion on most Lolicons I’ve encountered (and blocked) What enrages me about them is (aside from how many of them are rightwingers) the curious way in which they refuse to engage with the fact that this interest is indeed a “deviant” desire, and will basically rewrite entire histories and their narrative of themselves to put themselves at the center, screaming “I’m Normal!! I’m normal!! Everyone ELSE though (the queers and the Wokes) is a DEGENERATE, but I’m NORMAL” and there’s a lack of idk… awareness to have any sort of compassion or solidarity for other freak creators or nerds. And thus, that coldness is duly returned lmao. (Shotacons I tend to personally observe generally overlap with fujos, and thus usually have an awareness of misogyny and homophobia). Not everyone is like this of course, but this is my pattern of observation.
