Nymphet (Kodomo no Jikan)

[mokenju1]

Well, we were talking not a long time ago about how Rule of Rose publishers were scared about a bad public reaction towards their game and decided to not sell it in UK.

Now Seven Seas who was going to publish the english translation of Kodomo no Jikan has decided to not sell it too, after a short hiatus. Some people has blamed ANN forums where people started to complain about the future release of a manga which tells the story of a eight years old child who wants to seduce her 23 years old teacher. Other say that the thing is just that Seven Seas has realized that it was not very intelligent to sell a niche loli manga like Nymphet when they are trying to release a new collection targeted to children . That raises some interesting questions:

- Usa market is really ready to sell this kind of manga? I mean, there is enough people interested in lolicon there?

- And if there is enough people interested to buy it, Borders or any big "shops" would be interested in sell lolicon labelled to mature audiences?

-A single web page like ANN can put enough pressure above a publisher company to stop the release of a manga?

- One of the manga pages people have shared to try to show that Kodoma no Jikan shouldn't be released in the USA depictes the young loli writting the words "I want you to ejaculate inside me". Although this manga wouldn't show nudity or explicit scenes this kind of "humor" is acceptable in Usa (or Europe BTW)?

- Could the release of a manga like KNJ make worse the reputation of manga/anime fans in USA making people believe they are all a bunch of dangerous pedophiles (this time with a good reason )?

So, what do you think? It's a bad or a good thing that Seven Seas is not going to release KNJ?

[Matt_D]

Has anyone read Lolita?

I think this is a pretty depressing kneejerk reaction showing the quite discusting reactionary opinions in modern western society.

We're slowly slipping back into the dark ageas I'm afraid, where you can only tell tales that are acceptable to the general public. Just becouse something is a dubius market doesn't mean you should be allowed to supress it. And lets remember the cold hard facts in the world, In the UK 6/7 children were abducted and sexually abused/killed by strangers, about 80 were sexually abused/killed by family and or close family friends.

Numbers were on the bbc a while ago.

This reactionary fear and persecution of various forms of art and literature sicken me and seem to show our nations in a depressing light.

If you can't tell stories that claw at peoples ideals and threaten boundaries there is no point in writing, lets all just get out the Bible and enjoy the stories in there forever.

In the manga in question the story revolves around the teacher having none of it, *sighs* defenetly shows that a large percent of the vocal anime community to be nothing better then Sun and daily mirror readers, a bunch of reactionary cowards who like to stamp their own twisted cookie cutter sub par moral standards on others thinking that people are unable to read challenging material without becoming monsters. But then again I suppose most anime fans are Emos who are just cookie cutter archetypes so I guess they may be right.

Lalalalalalallaaa this is my general opinion on alot of things btw - Racism, fascism, homophobia, homosexuality, suicide, violence, sex, etc... they make for interesting and challenging material.

[Jake]

*sighs* defenetly shows that a large percent of the vocal anime community to be nothing better then Sun and daily mirror readers, a bunch of reactionary cowards who like to stamp their own twisted cookie cutter sub par moral standards on others thinking that people are unable to read challenging material without becoming monsters.

So, uh... human beings, then? People from all walks of life are like that, there's no reason to single out tabloid readers or anime fans in particular. And really, I'd call the Daily Mail worse than the Sun or the Mirror...

But then again I suppose most anime fans are Emos who are just cookie cutter archetypes so I guess they may be right.

Um... yes. That's the only logical conclusion. What?!


To answer the questions posed:

- Usa market is really ready to sell this kind of manga? I mean, there is enough people interested in lolicon there?

I doubt it. I rather suspect that, given the sensationalism and witch-hunt atmosphere surrounding paedophilia, which spills over onto lolicon, even if there were enough people in the US or in Europe who were interested in such titles probably only a tiny fraction of them would dare buy them.

And don't get me wrong; I'm definitely of the opinion that molesting children is quite, quite wrong. I just don't think it's anywhere near the worst crime a human being can commit - there's a total lack of perspective surrounding the issue - and I don't see any reason to believe it's necessarily the case that reading lolicon manga makes you more likely to rape children, any more than reading Berserk makes you more likely to go cut people up with a huge sword or reading W-Juliet makes you want to start cross-dressing.

- And if there is enough people interested to buy it, Borders or any big "shops" would be interested in sell lolicon labelled to mature audiences?

I doubt that, too. It wouldn't take long for some loud-mouthed moral-minority activist to find out and flood the tabloid press with "Borders sells child porn" stories, which would kill them.

-A single web page like ANN can put enough pressure above a publisher company to stop the release of a manga?

I think it's more likely that Seven Seas realised that it was a couple of steps further than their previous lineup, and it would not only be hard to sell but also probably sully their reputation. If ANN had anything to do with it it was probably just to point out to SS just how quickly people notice that kind of thing, that they'd be unlikely to be able to sell such a title 'under the radar' for very long.

Although this manga wouldn't show nudity or explicit scenes this kind of "humor" is acceptable in Usa (or Europe BTW)?

Again, I doubt it. The US is notorious for a puritan approach bordering on censorship; one only has to browse - say - the CBLDF's history to see that attitudes like "comics are for kids, selling pornographic comics in the same district as a school is the same as selling porn to children" or "drawing a depiction of a rape is as bad as committing/endorsing rape" are still quite prevalent, for example. Here in the UK, the presumption that interest in child pornography leads inevitably to raping children is more or less engrained in the public consciousness from a decades-long media barrage, and the majority of people will file lolicon on equal footing with actual porn. The man on the street will happily assume that someone who wants to read such material will, given the chance, rape children.

- Could the release of a manga like KNJ make worse the reputation of manga/anime fans in USA making people believe they are all a bunch of dangerous pedophiles (this time with a good reason Laughing )?

Frankly it amazes me constantly that the people who rail against anime and manga don't make a bigger thing of lolicon already - I can only presume it's because they're too lazy to properly research the media (possibly because the ones who do research it find it's not so bad as they think?) and never come across anything which isn't pushed in their faces in book and video shops. So yes, I'd worry that the more lolicon material gets published in English, the more likely it is that the tabloid press will start running "all anime fans want to rape children" and "Japan is training our youth to be paedophiles" articles. The principled libertarian in me wants to say that this shouldn't stop anyone from publishing anything [legal] that they want to, but the realist in me suspects that human beings are too stupid for proper libertarianism, and it would be disastrous if too many people did.

[DaFool]

If you can't tell stories that claw at peoples ideals and threaten boundaries there is no point in writing, lets all just get out the Bible and enjoy the stories in there forever.

The Bible contains plenty of depictions of sex and violence. Heck, a true rendition of it, especially the Old Testament, would play like 300.

[Matt_D]

I should raise a flag and say that this whole area tends to get me very stroppy. But I think censorship is something worth getting angry about.

I agree with everything Jake said *ponders*

From what I've ganered the manga in question is significantly less explicit then Lolita.

I just feel there is a certain undercurrent of censorship reemerging, and an unwitting creation of pretence and prescident (if you watch extreme porn you will kill and rape woman, if you look at cartoon pictures of girls you will rape children, if you watch violent films you will commit violence, if you read about nuclear reactors you may blow one up), O the lords blew the extreme porn laws out of the water, good for them. There was a time Life of Brian couldn't show in cinemas becouse of the old witch Mary Whitehouse.

Besides I think most pedophiles are far more interested in watching lazytown.

[Jake]

O the lords blew the extreme porn laws out of the water, good for them.

It's a total sideline to the topic, but... I'm a firm believer in the principles behind democracy, and a republican in the British sense of the word, and the last few years of British politics kind of scare me - repeatedly, the only people really making a proper stand for my rights are the unelected aristoracy, and the government's systematically trying to neuter or disassemble them on the same grounds I'd normally totally agree with. :/

[Matt_D]

Technically it's off the topic I suppose, however I actually think it's quite important.

I know, it's strange the past few years have left me at a quandry and to be honest now that I think about it more having an uneleceted group of peers as opposed to an elected group of media puppets has it's advantages. Especially power positions like Law Lords.

It is quite telling though, the Lords can do these things becouse they don't need to worry about public opinion, they don't need to worry about the media, they just worry about doing what they think is right. It's very odd, and has made me reasses my opinions on the matter. Now days I think an elected upper house would be a dangerous beast indeed.

[DaFool]

I agree with preserving aristocracy / royalty and having them have some share of power.

I was arguing this with my brother not too long ago... he wanted ALL semblance of royalty on the face of the earth to be annihilated. But I told him that royalty is the only power balance to counter the bi-directional vicious cycle of

<-> Democracy <-> Communism <-> Fascism <->

(isn't it ironic that fascists often want to proclaim themselves king? )

All of these systems of government are made possible by the people and how they are swayed and manipulated by their leaders.

...oh, what was the topic again?

[Matt_D]

hehe

however in a modern democracy it is no longer the people who control the government, it all to often seems to be the media that taps into a primal fear (in this case pedophillia) it then milks this as hard as it can so the public simply seem to eat down the madness. Then the people start making there demands and their pickets and the like, they rant both in the real world and online. Is this becoming fantasised? /fanatic/

It's a similar thing with say terrorism except the government feeds fear to the media, the media feed it to the people, and then the people cheer when the government take away their hard fought freedoms.

as to "what was the subject again" I think all we've done is taken the origonal subject matter out of a greater debate (the initial subject was a somewhat loli manga, however the debate is more about freedoms and reactionism.)

The best way to make sure everyone is safe is to watch everyone 24 hours a day and for anyone who steps out of line to be reducated. But in such a cage is life worth living?

[PyTom]

Hm... some points:

Let me point out that, as far as I can tell, the US government isn't a factor in this. So I think that the seeing this as the first step in an inevitable slide into fascism is a bit much.

(Slightly off topic, I wonder if the the traditional role of the House of Lords was similar to the US supreme court... a mostly non-political body that can guarantee the rights of individuals without having to answer to the masses. I suspect it's them, not really the monarchy, that guaranteed rights... and IIRC, recent reforms have limited the power of the Lords, even beyond eliminating the... um... "hereditary peers", right? I'm in general not a fan of hereditary offices, although in the UK the monarchy seems mostly harmless, and Prince Harry seems like a decent guy.)

My gut feeling is that Seven Seas took a look at Nymphet, and the reaction from some of the community, and decided that it was not in their best interest to publish it. That makes sense... a book like this could trigger big time outrage, and that could destroy the manga section in bookstores, which would severely hurt Seven Sea's business.

Remember, part of freedom of speech (and of the press) is that you have the right to publish whatever you want. Another part of that freedom is that I have the right to criticize you, and to boycott you if I think what you're publishing is over the line. Freedom works in both directions.

I read Kodomo no Jikan yesterday, and it's really pushing the bounds of what one would expect to see in the manga section of the bookstore. I would expect it to be shrinkwrapped... and it may be that Seven Seas just didn't want to get into that.

(I also believe that Canada is somewhat strict about importing adult manga, so that may have factored into the decision somewhat.)

[PyTom]

Oh, and just to follow up, the president of Seven Seas has released a statement that explains his reasoning:

http://www.gomanga.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5313

[Jake]

Let me point out that, as far as I can tell, the US government isn't a factor in this. So I think that the seeing this as the first step in an inevitable slide into fascism is a bit much.

Well, one could argue that the German government wasn't really directly to blame for the conditions which promoted fascism in 1930s Germany. While I don't see many of those conditions in the US either, I do think it is fair to suggest that fascist parties will have a lot less trouble coming to power in a country which has already accepted an absolute homogenous morality than those which still practice individual freedoms. And it is pretty tempting to assert that the tabloid/TV press is leading the population of both of our countries down that route...

(Slightly off topic, I wonder if the the traditional role of the House of Lords was similar to the US supreme court... a mostly non-political body that can guarantee the rights of individuals without having to answer to the masses. I suspect it's them, not really the monarchy, that guaranteed rights...

That certainly seems to be the case today, but it definitely wasn't always. The nearest we have to the US constitution is the Magna Carta, which the monarch of the day more or less signed at sword-point, our 'constitution' is built up piecemeal in law rather than embodied in a single document, and the roles various bodies play have really evolved over the centuries rather than been explicitly decided by anybody. Parliament was originally the King's circle of advisors, the House of Lords grew out of the obvious influence the aristocracy had over the crown.

and IIRC, recent reforms have limited the power of the Lords, even beyond eliminating the... um... "hereditary peers", right?

Basically, yeah. The current game is that the Lords are on a lower footing than the Commons anyway, and the government can use the Parliament Act to overrule them and push stuff through anyway. It's just that the Lords usually reject things because they're bloody stupid and nobody likes them, so the Parliament Act tends to make the government look even more of a spoiled child than usual.

Earlier this year, the Commons passed a [IIRC non-binding] vote to dissolve the Lords more or less entirely and replace it with an elected body, which is certainly what New Labour wants. I find myself hoping they don't get around to it until the next General Election, which seems likely to be barely won by the Conservatives...

(I also believe that Canada is somewhat strict about importing adult manga, so that may have factored into the decision somewhat.)

I was told Canada had just outright banned lolicon from within its borders...

[F.I.A]

From the statement:

Sure, I’d flipped through them before, and what I saw on a cursory glance seemed harmless enough. But this time I sat down and read the series carefully in Japanese, and what I found in volumes two and three were very disturbing. (Particularly, pages 129-131 in volume three, which are highly problematic.) So much so, that I now have to retract some of what I said in my first letter where I tried to defend the content, because certain scenes in the subsequent volumes are indefensible and inappropriate, in my opinion.

Not to sound bad, but he had not read the whole series first before thinking about translating it? If to be put in a metaphore, it is like eating a medicine without knowing well the side effect of long term overdose! Now I am wondering what are those manga licensing group doing. Taking a few glimpse of a random manga, think it is cute and then decide to translate it?

While it is true that rules and regulations should not limit the freedom of literacy(For this case, the manga), the problem might be the reader it might expose to. From what I know, in parents' eyes, manga is comic, and comic will always be for the kids. There will be always blame-cases of their children getting their hand on... "adulterated" comics, sometimes unintentionally by their own hands.

For animation example, one need to try and see Strange Dawn. When one is exposed to those cute plushie like cretins being involved in killing and sex matters, it is definitely not the best "babysit" cartoon. Period.

[monele]

Not to sound bad, but he had not read the whole series first before thinking about translating it?

In in defense, he did say they had to be quick to get licenses and so they often tried to arrange things before actual volumes were even published in Japan. This means he might not have had the possibility to read that far at the time?

I know nothing about the manga and the company but some I wonder about something suddenly : what if the manga kept being "okay" in everything that was available at the time... so they decided to publish it... and it actually didn't create any big problem at that point.... and *then* the new chapters turn out to be really morally bad material. What happens then? It might have been an even worse uproar since they would have had to cancel it as it was published... or go on and risk a *lot* with the general opinion ^^;...

(I'm thinking of some japanese authors who have been rather random in their ways and changed their stories right in the middle, going for totally different moods...)

[PyTom]

Don't forget, Seven Seas announced the license in July of 2006... and that means that they probably negotiated the license a month or two before. Kodomo no Jikan started in May 2005. So it's quite possible that the objectionable material, which appeared in Volume 3, had not even been written when the book was licensed.