Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Phillipines: House wants to ban pornographic cartoon

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Source: House of Representatives



Hentai, the Japanese pornographic cartoon that depicts children in explicit sexual activity, is considered child pornography material and one may be severely penalized by just mere possession of it.

A bill banning this pornographic cartoon was approved recently by the Joint House Committees on Justice and Welfare of Children chaired by Rep. Matias Defensor (3rd District, Quezon City) and Rep. Monica Prieto-Teodoro (1st District, Tarlac), respectively.

Prieto-Teodoro, one of the authors of the measure, said the bill penalizes the offenders who sell, offer, advertise, and promote child pornography; and have been found to possess, download, purchase, reproduce, or make available child pornography materials with the intent of selling or distributing them.

Prieto-Teodoro said child pornography material refers to the means and methods in which a child carries out pornography.

"It can be in forms of visual depiction, audio representation and written text or materials that advocate explicit sexual activity with a child," Prieto-Teodoro said.

She explained that the said images of real and indistinguishable children in films, digital images or computer images, whether made or produced electronically or mechanically; drawings, cartoons, sculptures or paintings depicting children in an explicit sexual activity are just some of the visual depictions considered as child pornography materials.

Prieto-Teodoro said there is a need for a legislative measure to address this disturbing social phenomena considering that the provisions of RA7160 or the Special Protection of Children Against Child Abuse, Exploitation and Discrimination Act are mainly related to child prostitution and do not provide adequate protection to victims of other forms of sexual exploitation particularly child pornography.

The bill provides that the mere possession of drawings, cartoons, digital images, computer-generated images -- even if it is indistinguishable from that of real children engaging in an explicit sexual activity – may be penalized with 6 to 12 years imprisonment and a fine of not more than P500,000.

The measure also imposes 12 to 20 years imprisonment and a fine of not more than P2 million to violators who have been found guilty of committing unlawful acts such as hiring, employing, using, persuading, inducing, or coercing a child to perform in the production of child pornography, including its production people.


Wow, I'm sure that will REALLY protect children from abuse! We all know that all these types of laws do is drive whatever is illegal into the underground market making it even harder to control. Unless you're a person who owns thousands of videos, nobody is going to bother you. Are the police going to look in everyone house? Like piracy laws, this never works.

4 comments:

The Yen Man said...

Well, here's my take on this issue when it comes to hentai. If it keeps all the in-closet pedo's satisfied, then realistically isn't it kind of protecting real life kids from being exploited? Not that I care either way because 1.) I don't watch it and 2.) I don't live in the Phillipines, but I see this as being counter-productive in protecting children.

Degenerasian said...

Agree. If these sick guys can't get their cartoon porn, they'll go out and get real kids!

Gawain said...

Interesting take on it. In the same line of thought, if I DIDN'T have violent video games I could kill people in, I'd be out in the street with the rest of the violence-starved gun-toting mad men... I really don't think so :)

But yeah, stupid decision. I really don't see why we're trying to put everyone in these safe little pink bubbles. Kids now a days have so little resistance in their childhoods that as soon as they meet some sort of obstacle in their teens they just break down. Be it physical or mental. Kindergarden kids with helmets, sterilized playgrounds. At this rate we'll all be institutionalized in a couple of generations!

The Yen Man said...

Actually, my argument isn't neccessarily that if they ban cartoon porn that people will go and directly abuse little kids. My argument is that these people will turn to the internet for their "fix" and potentially drive up demand for the real stuff. This indirectly causes more harm for kids.