Should lolicon / shotacon be considered drawn child pornography?

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

Nobody's calling for that and you know it. Stop being disingenuous.

No shit, but the principle is the same. It's your logic, applied elsewhere.

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

No shit, but the principle is the same. It's your logic, applied elsewhere.

Its not the same principle. Murder is clearly and easily defined. And while there is a grey area with self-defense, a lot that is many governments refusing to even acknowledge self-defense or define it as narrowly as possible to make it impossible to win a case on that. Once you you start talking about making drawings illegal on some vague notions of morality sexual interest, then you just open a Pandora's Box of bullshit.

 

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

Its not the same principle. Murder is clearly and easily defined. And while there is a grey area with self-defense, a lot that is many governments refusing to even acknowledge self-defense or define it as narrowly as possible to make it impossible to win a case on that. Once you you start talking about making drawings illegal on some vague notions of morality sexual interest, then you just open a Pandora's Box of bullshit.

Murder is not clearly and easily defined and you went on to explain why, basically making my argument for me here. I'll concede that sexual immorality is more difficult to define than murder, but what exactly constitutes murder is still debatable. Hell, aside from self-defense some people consider the death penalty murder, that's legal. Abortion is murder, that's legal.

So just because something can't be nailed down definitively doesn't mean restrictions can't be in place, even if they're imperfect. Enforcing traditional views of morality is not opening Pandora's Box, rejecting them is; take a look around.

 

[Misao Hyper]

wild how many years this thread has been lol. If you like Loli, you fantasize about child like characters. It's that simple, because that's the fucking entire point. No, the drawn girl actually being a 6000 year old dark elf fairy princess doesn't change it. You know why she was drawn 3'11 with AAA breast and no pubes and so does everyone else who looks at it, law enforcement included. There's no debate to even be had on the topic, it's like trying to debate if granny porn is for someone into grannies, no shit it is, and a burger restaurant is for people who like burgers and I look up navel porn due to an unhealthy obsession with belly buttons. This is just how things are, if you seek out images of a child drawn or otherwise, then, well... Beside loli comes from a country with Junior idols and legal Junior gravure, it's very fucking obvious what and who it is drawn for. Anyways I am now going to go back to watching 30 year old Japanese women who make themselves look 12 for their aging audience of japanese salarymen fake wrestle, peace, y'all.

 

[demicolon]

You guys know that New Zealand demanded Null to surrended user data so they could charge any NZ user with child pornography for the Christchurch shooting?

CSAM is illegal because a child is harmed to produce it, tracing photos of children to draw cartoon pornography is illegal, fictional loli shit is not illegal and IMO that's the best compromise. I hate weed but jailing people for a joint is dumb.

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

Murder is not clearly and easily defined and you went on to explain why, basically making my argument for me here.

If I just walk up and shoot you in the head, that's clear cut murder, no debate. If I walk up and try to shoot you in head, but you grab the gun at the last minute, and turn it on me in the ensuing struggle and shoot me instead, that's self-defense, but many jurisdictions would still charge you with murder (or manslaughter) anyway. Murder is clear and easy. Self-defense is the grey zone. But even then, much of the greyness is largely on how the legal system chooses to deal with it.

Hell, aside from self-defense some people consider the death penalty murder, that's legal. Abortion is murder, that's legal.

Some people consider any taking of a life to be murder, no matter the circumstance. But that is neither here nor there; its an inherently moral question. Murder is clearly and easily legally defined. The death penalty isn't murder because is a legal punishment for wrongdoing, so can't be murder by the legal definition. Whether or not abortion should be classified as murder will probably be a legal question that will gain far more scrutiny now that Roe v. Wade has been overturned.

Self-defense is a legal defense that can employed in murder cases, as well as a general philosophical concept. Whether something is self-defense legally, or morally, is two completely different questions, and the government can be more or less stringent on that question. But the government itself has set clear and absolute definitions and boundaries on what can't be considered self-defense, and slightly less absolute, though generally clear boundaries what can be self-defense. The law is as non-ambiguous as possible on the subject, with the ambiguity coming mostly in the form of how each individual situation plays out, and certain aspects that can only ever be ambiguous and taken on inference, because they rely on figuring out someone's intent, such as whether or not they reasonably feared for their life (which is a requirement in many jurisdictions for a self-defense plea to work).

So just because something can't be nailed down definitively doesn't mean restrictions can't be in place, even if they're imperfect. Enforcing traditional views of morality is not opening Pandora's Box, rejecting them is; take a look around.

The Pandora's Box is trying to legislate something that inherently subjective and undefinable. The thread title asks a very simple question: Should lolicon/shotacon be considered drawn child pornography? In absolute objective, scientific terms? No. Child Pornography is specifically porn made of actual children. Drawn characters are not real and don't fit that definition in any sense. Using the term "drawn child pornography" only muddies the usage of the term child pornography itself, because there is absolutely actual drawn child pornography; someone can sketch a real child doing a sexual act, and that absolutely would count as such. Lolicon/shotacon is artwork, period. No real children are abused in its creation.

Is Lolicon/shotacon child pornography legally? In the United States, no, because the Supreme Court already defined child pornography as a concept, and explained why it should be illegal as a concept, and they specifically cited the fact that it harms real children. A loli character is not a real child. In fact, within the confines of the story, a loli may not be a child at all (such as the infamous 3000 year old vampire meme). And, as we've seen time and again, people will call grown ass characters who don't even look childlike in the slightest lolis and call people who enjoy a work with those characters "pedophiles". Loli is not a description of a character's age; its a character archetype and design aesthetic. It would be impossible to regulate objectively.

 

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

Some people consider any taking of a life to be murder, no matter the circumstance. But that is neither here nor there; its an inherently moral question. Murder is clearly and easily legally defined.

What you're not understanding is the purpose of law is inherently moral, you're trying to separate the legalistic and moral elements, but that's virtually impossible. We don't even need the extreme case of murder to see this, look at drug laws. We have those because doing drugs is immoral, it hurts the user. That's why there's traditionally been restrictions on gambling, it's also why obscenity laws exist in the first place. A just law, the only kind desirable, is informed by a moral need for restriction of an immoral deed.

The Pandora's Box is trying to legislate something that inherently subjective and undefinable.

There's an argument to be made for objective morality, that this issue is not subjective. If you want to go down the path of moral relativism, calling it subjective, then we could argue anything is okay, bring back slavery.

The thread title asks a very simple question: Should lolicon/shotacon be considered drawn child pornography? In absolute objective, scientific terms? No.

So what is it then? What is being depicted, a picnic between adults, or something else?

Is Lolicon/shotacon child pornography legally? In the United States, no, because the Supreme Court already defined child pornography as a concept, and explained why it should be illegal as a concept, and they specifically cited the fact that it harms real children.

I'm not arguing it is actual child pornography nor even its moral equivalent, I'm arguing it's still an obscene, fictional pornographic depiction of children which should be banned on its own merits.

A loli character is not a real child. In fact, within the confines of the story, a loli may not be a child at all (such as the infamous 3000 year old vampire meme).

Drawing a kid and calling it a 3000 year old vampire won't change what's depicted. If you draw a sexualized character and call it an apple, and then distribute it around in public, you'll be arrested because despite your insistence that the character is just your every day ordinary apple, it's not.

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

What you're not understanding is the purpose of law is inherently moral, you're trying to separate the legalistic and moral elements, but that's virtually impossible.

There are plenty of laws that have no real moral implications. Minimum parking requirements for example, or zoning laws. Laws are about establishing order in chaos. This can have a moral element, and traditionally, laws were entirely moral, or even religious in nature, such as Canon Law or Sharia Law. But modern law making systems aren't inherently moral or tied to any inherent morality, and as society in general becomes more morally relativistic, this will only become more pronounced. Moral considerations are never the only, or even primary, considerations of the law, and attempts to legislate morality, such a alcohol prohibition, tend to fail utterly because the law is mainly downstream of morality, not upstream; more reflection of moral norms and standards rather than a setter of them.

We have those because doing drugs is immoral, it hurts the user.

And even now there are calls for mending or abolishing most of said drug laws. Cynical people see drug laws not as a result of morality, but of government's inherent attempt to control something it can't properly regulate nor tax.

A just law, the only kind desirable, is informed by a moral need for restriction of an immoral deed.

Just laws are a matter of debate and opinion. Plenty of laws on the books right now that many people consider inherently unjust. "Just law" is a phrase of no definition. A "good" law is one that is well explained, with all of its terms and proscriptions clearly defined, understandable to the common man that it is being imposed upon, with a clear delineation of what it is trying to proscribe or regulate, that violates no other existing, higher laws. "Obscenity" is disappearing in the U.S. because it can't clearly do any of those things, because "obscenity" is inherently subjective, making said laws inherently subjective and boundless, while at the same time being slave to whatever the public considers obscene at the time, and in a society where fewer and fewer things are considered obscene every year, risks being rendered of non-effect entirely.

There's an argument to be made for objective morality, that this issue is not subjective.

There is an argument to be made for objective morality, but the question of this thread isn't necessarily a moral question. Its a practical, or, if you want to look at it another way, legal one. It depends on going upon the literal, objective definition of terms. This question isn't asking whether or not lolicon/shotacon is morally right or wrong, but does it count as drawn child pornography. The answer, in the practical and legal context, is no.

So what is it then? What is being depicted, a picnic between adults, or something else?

What is being depicted is a drawing. What that drawing is or is not supposed to be is to be defined by the author, or, if you believe in death of the author theory, by the audience. But it has no practical connection to anything in real life.

I'm not arguing it is actual child pornography nor even its moral equivalent, I'm arguing it's still an obscene, fictional pornographic depiction of children which should be banned on its own merits.

The question of the thread is whether or not its drawn child pornography. The point you are arguing is unrelated to the question. But to deal with your point, specifically, obscenity is a subjective, non-existent standard. I can simply say I find nothing obscene about the images in question. As for being a "fictional pornographic depiction of children", this assumes that all lolis are in fact children, which is untrue, defeating this point, and leaving a massive loophole in your logic. In fact, no lolis are children because none of them are real people, and whether or not they are fictional children is entirely dependent on the artist bothering to define them as such. As for whether or not it should be banned on its own merits, now you are asking to ban artwork based on you finding it personally obscene, not for any object value such as personally harming someone or causing a natural disaster, or having any other tangible effect on the world. But just because it depicts something you personally dislike. Do you not see the inherent danger in that thinking?

Drawing a kid and calling it a 3000 year old vampire won't change what's depicted.

But it objectively does. Its only a child if the author defines it as such, because it has no objective reality outside the author's personal actions in creating it. I could declare that adult Goku in Dragonball is a child, but that would be objectively untrue. If Toriyama comes out and says that adult Goku is the same age as his childlike self, only aged up via magic, then Goku is now in fact a child, even though he is physically an adult in appearance, despite the fact I spent the last 20+ years thinking of him as an adult. Do you see how arbitrary that is?

If you draw a sexualized character and call it an apple, and then distribute it around in public, you'll be arrested because despite your insistence that the character is just your every day ordinary apple, it's not.

Except you wouldn't be arrested in many countries, like the United States, because that wouldn't be illegal, as long you didn't pass on your sexualized drawing to children. But its a bad analogy anyway. An apple has a objective appearance. A drawing of an apple is identifiable as an apple, even if its not based on any particular apple. A loli character, however, is only identifiable as human. That doesn't make it anything else. It isn't necessarily a child; there are plenty of childlike, petite fully grown women in the world today who aren't children, and there are plenty of lolis who also aren't children.

And even if it was a child, based on the author's statement or statements made in the work, so what? A loli is not a person, nor do the represent a real person. They are recognizably "human" in appearance in as much as they are based on general human qualities, unless they aren't even human to begin with. But it is not a being with thoughts or feelings, nor any rights that need to be protected. It is worthy or no more special treatment than any other drawing.

 

[Kerr Avon]

And even if it was a child, based on the author's statement or statements made in the work, so what?

You need a hard drive check asap

 

[skykiii]

Is there a there a theoretical possibility of a law being abused? Absolutely, technically, but by that logic we shouldn't ban anything because the slimmest possibility of some sort of overreaching exists.

Sounds good to me. When we start living in a world where human beings start acting human and stop acting like computers with autistically literal (when it suits them) interpretations of the law, then we can have law again.

 

[Misao Hyper]

people are writing essays to defend being attracted to 2D children. We have become the lolcows.

 

[God of Nothing]

...you're telling me it isn't?

 

[Tablet County]

 

[Adjeesh Dickshit]

Loli / Shota is fictional CP. Supporting CP empowers pedophiles. Giving governments / strong authorities legal justification to haphazardly act as they please however is also bad given that it would be equally empowering the pedophiles (genius joke about governments, I know). I think it would be better if such crimes were overseen by local / sheriff ran courts and for cases to be settled through such means as epic duels to the death over one's honor as a non-faggot.

 

[skykiii]

Do you not see the inherent danger in that thinking?

SSJ_Ness once said that a ten year old rape victim should be forced to give birth because abortion is always wrong, even in cases where even the most staunch anti-abortion types would consider making an exception.

So no, he doesn't understand. He's pretty much the Kiwi version of HasanAbi.

Its funny, really.... Kiwi is an entire forum of people who have been suffering under increased political correctness and social norms that push for disastrous, censorious things, and even point out many many cases where the left's censorship has come back to bite them.... and yet, here in the A&N part of the forum, they always have these huge blinders on with regards to their own stupid "we want thing X banned because Muh Morals!" beliefs.

Because that worked out so well for Frederick Wertham....

 

[Tablet County]

Its funny, really.... Kiwi is an entire forum of people who have been suffering under increased political correctness and social norms that push for disastrous, censorious things, and even point out many many cases where the left's censorship has come back to bite them.... and yet, here in the A&N part of the forum, they always have these huge blinders on with regards to their own stupid "we want thing X banned because Muh Morals!" beliefs.

Because that worked out so well for Frederick Wertham....

I think that really is the crux of the argument. The slippery slope gets talked about a lot on this forum with regards to the entropic nature of libertine degeneracy, but the other end of that mountain doesn't get a whole lot of the spotlight.

Fuck lolicon and lolicons. I would not weep if I woke up tomorrow and loli was banned and all loli artists were rounded up and sent to their country's respective gulag analogue. But at the same time, I feel as if the banning of lolicon would set a bad precedent. Not the precedent that the law is (theoretically) against pedophilia—that's a good precedent and it's already been set—rather the precedent that a form of """""art""""" can be banned just for being repugnant.

It sounds like a good idea on paper, because pedophiles and lolicons are safe and acceptable targets, but you have to remember you are giving the government carte blanche to illegalize anything that offends their sensibilities, an ability they only have now through soft-power loopholes. Imagine the kind of ruinous shit they could do if they didn't have to perform political gymnastics to destroy their ideological enemies.

That's not to say that loli is some kind of bastion holding back authoritarianism, just that I feel we should be cautious of the potential repercussions of banning a form of """""expression""""" no matter how fucked and degen it is.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go have a good cry in the shower, because indirectly or not I just argued on the side of lolicon and I feel icky all over.

 

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

There are plenty of laws that have no real moral implications. Minimum parking requirements for example, or zoning laws. Laws are about establishing order in chaos.

So why do parking laws exist? And "establishing order in chaos", what's the purpose of doing that?

Moral considerations are never the only, or even primary, considerations of the law, and attempts to legislate morality, such a alcohol prohibition, tend to fail utterly because the law is mainly downstream of morality, not upstream; more reflection of moral norms and standards rather than a setter of them.

You will not find one law without moral consideration at some level. Even the left's lunacy comes from their own warped sense of morality, they make it illegal not to mutilate gender confused minors, which is an abominable act, but from their alleged perspective it's for the person's own good.

Even North Korea's laws have a moral component, as vapid and insane as they may be. Pick any one of these random seeming laws and they can all be traced back to some moral consideration even in this extreme case; Kim Jong-un's essentially acting as a god whose ways are right at his own assertion. Other ways are bad then, and as the definition of "moral" is simply "of or relating to principles of right and wrong in behavior", his laws are "moral" in nature. In North Korea, Kim Jong-un dictates what's right and wrong, period.

In comparison, America is largely based on all things being derived from God as its bedrock principles:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

It is from that everything else follows, all law was in accordance with this.

Also, a law failing to curb an issue is irrelevant, drugs being illegal hasn't stopped people from using them.

And even now there are calls for mending or abolishing most of said drug laws.

So what? They see a law as unjust, but it's still a moral consideration on both sides. Law exists to enforce morality, just because not everyone will agree what's best or most moral is irrelevant, the law is shaped by morality.

"Obscenity" is disappearing in the U.S. because it can't clearly do any of those things, because "obscenity" is inherently subjective, making said laws inherently subjective and boundless, while at the same time being slave to whatever the public considers obscene at the time, and in a society where fewer and fewer things are considered obscene every year, risks being rendered of non-effect entirely.

You could argue slavery is an inherently subjective matter. There's people who think blacks aren't human and should still be slaves, or that Jews should all be killed. Yeah, obscenity is subjective in a world that has lost its way, sure, just as how we allow abortion because unborn babies aren't human to feminists, but it is murder.

Traditional Christian morality informed much of our law for a long time, but as the nation adopts leftism as its secular religion our laws change to reflect that set of morals instead.

This question isn't asking whether or not lolicon/shotacon is morally right or wrong, but does it count as drawn child pornography. The answer, in the practical and legal context, is no.

What is being depicted is a drawing.

Do you see the problem here? You don't define what is being drawn, you just say the drawing is a drawing. A drawing of what? It is drawn "blank"--fill in the blank for me.

In fact, no lolis are children because none of them are real people, and whether or not they are fictional children is entirely dependent on the artist bothering to define them as such.

This is a strawman. I'm not saying they're real, they're obviously not since they're just lines on paper, but no, it's not entirely dependent on the artist. People are able to see what is depicted for themselves. Is there some grey area, sure, the age of a character can be ambiguous, but there's plenty of times it's not.

As for whether or not it should be banned on its own merits, now you are asking to ban artwork based on you finding it personally obscene, not for any object value such as personally harming someone or causing a natural disaster, or having any other tangible effect on the world. But just because it depicts something you personally dislike. Do you not see the inherent danger in that thinking?

If you're really concerned about one person banning something based on personal dislike, then you could take it to a vote. I'm not of the mind that democracy necessarily yields good results, but I'm sure the majority would vote to ban it, so no matter how you look at it there's not much reason for it to be legal aside from a minority of people wanting it legal. But there will always be a minority wanting something, you quite literally cannot please everyone.

I could declare that adult Goku in Dragonball is a child, but that would be objectively untrue. If Toriyama comes out and says that adult Goku is the same age as his childlike self, only aged up via magic, then Goku is now in fact a child, even though he is physically an adult in appearance, despite the fact I spent the last 20+ years thinking of him as an adult.

You're arguing canon, I'm arguing physical depiction. You and Toriyama could both say Goku is a child despite clearly having adult anatomy, but the truth is an adult body is being depicted, even despite not being entirely realistic in its art style.

You'd have an easier time with this line of argument choosing more abstract art styles, like Shin Chan or Power Puff Girls, where the designs are only roughly humanoid, and I'd be more inclined to agree, but nobody sees an image of Goku and reasonably perceives it as childish anatomy:

Except you wouldn't be arrested in many countries, like the United States, because that wouldn't be illegal, as long you didn't pass on your sexualized drawing to children.

So you've conceded that public perception matters, people can see it's not a harmless apple but a sexualized drawing of something other than an apple.

An apple has a objective appearance. A drawing of an apple is identifiable as an apple, even if its not based on any particular apple. A loli character, however, is only identifiable as human.

Right, as human. And people can perceive the intended age of a character rather easily with little to no debate as long as the art style is at least semi-realistic, which is the point I'm making.

It isn't necessarily a child; there are plenty of childlike, petite fully grown women in the world today who aren't children

Sure, but there's no woman who looks like this character in the arms of the brunette, wouldn't you agree?

And even if it was a child, based on the author's statement or statements made in the work, so what?

So it'd be obscene, and even a vote would determine the same results, that's what.

They are recognizably "human" in appearance in as much as they are based on general human qualities, unless they aren't even human to begin with.

If they aren't human then it's different, if you're depicting a furry, robot, or monster then you're no longer depicting a human and it's an entirely separate argument. If someone wants to fap to childish designs in non-human characters it's very weird, but again very different, like those freaks who fap to Pokemon. Is this design weird? Yeah, but nobody would reasonably confuse Gothita as human:

But it is not a being with thoughts or feelings, nor any rights that need to be protected.

Nobody is trying to protect fictional kids, it is just a matter of morality, it's a question of what societal norms and standards we should uphold. Having an entirely amoral society encourages undesirable behavior in society which effects everyone.

 

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

SSJ_Ness once said that a ten year old rape victim should be forced to give birth because abortion is always wrong, even in cases where even the most staunch anti-abortion types would consider making an exception.

You're a retard, I never said abortion is "always wrong"; in a case where it's medically necessary then exceptions should be made, and at that age virtually all doctors would unanimously concur that the circumstances meet the criteria for that.

It's funny that you have to misrepresent my views on entirely separate topics, wording things as poorly as possible to spin perception of me badly. Are you a journalist, by chance? Yeah, you really got me bro, I'm against wanton slaughter of the unborn

 

[AnsemSoD1]

Lolicon and Shotacon are both based and Christian.

 

[The Demon Pimp of Razgriz]

So why do parking laws exist? And "establishing order in chaos", what's the purpose of doing that?

Not parking laws. Minimum Parking Requirements. These are laws imposed on developers that say that, when they build an apartment building, for example, they have to have a certain minimal number of parking spaces based on the number of bedrooms they have. The purpose of these laws is to encourage car centric development. Because most cities in the U.S. (and Canada) are already extremely car centric due to a variety of existing laws, such as Euclidean zoning, many cities passed laws obliging developers to ensure that their residential developments had parking so that people could get around cities in their cars. This, however, had the knock-on effect of encouraging yet more car centric development and encouraging car dependency. There is a growing movement now to eliminate or vastly diminish parking minimums in many cities so that non-car centric development can happen. These laws aren't moral in nature; they were practical in nature, created as a result of America's historically car centric mentality, which they exacerbated.

As for the purpose of establishing order in chaos, that is self-evident. Governments operate in order, not chaos. The law allows the government to function in orderly way, and control the actions of its citizenry. The purpose of the law is to establish that order.

You will not find one law without moral consideration at some level. Even the left's lunacy comes from their own warped sense of morality, they make it illegal not to mutilate gender confused minors, which is an abominable act, but from their alleged perspective it's for the person's own good.

People may try to justify a law with their personal sense of morality, but that doesn't mean that the law has an inherently moral component. One does not necessarily follow after the other.

Even North Korea's laws have a moral component, as vapid and insane as they may be. Pick any one of these random seeming laws and they can all be traced back to some moral consideration even in this extreme case; Kim Jong-un's essentially acting as a god whose ways are right at his own assertion. Other ways are bad then, and as the definition of "moral" is simply "of or relating to principles of right and wrong in behavior", his laws are "moral" in nature. In North Korea, Kim Jong-un dictates what's right and wrong, period.

The only moral component of North Korean law is whether or not the Kim dynasty wants them or not. North Korea could decide tomorrow to make the color blue illegal. There is no moral aspect or reasoning behind that; they just arbitrarily decided to do that. North Korea's laws are not about morality nor are they justified with morality; they are about control.

In comparison, America is largely based on all things being derived from God as its bedrock principles:

That is the Preamble to the United States Declaration of Independence, which isn't considered law in the United States. It has no bearing on U.S. law at all. Conversely, the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution says this:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

A clear elucidation of what the founders were actually trying to accomplish when they wrote the Constitution; to form a "more perfect union", to establish an orderly government. To ensure domestic tranquility. Order was their focus when they wrote the constitution, not morality. This is why the Constitution is silent on moral subjects and focuses entirely on government ones.

So what? They see a law as unjust, but it's still a moral consideration on both sides. Law exists to enforce morality, just because not everyone will agree what's best or most moral is irrelevant, the law is shaped by morality.

The law is shaped by morality in the sense that people look at it with a moral lens. But that doesn't make individual laws moral or immoral. It also speaks to the folly of laws trying to enforce morality at all; because morality is a fickle thing that changes with the wind. And the law can neither give morality nor truly enforce it.

You could argue slavery is an inherently subjective matter. There's people who think blacks aren't human and should still be slaves, or that Jews should all be killed.

The subjectivity of slavery's morality is beside the point. The point is that slavery itself was an objective reality. It could be objectively defined; owning another human being against his will. Therefore, it could be regulated, and eventually prohibited. Obscenity cannot be objectively defined; it is subjective to every man's personal point of view. This is why laws based on it are inherently flawed.

Traditional Christian morality informed much of our law for a long time, but as the nation adopts leftism as its secular religion our laws change to reflect that set of morals instead.

If American law was truly one to one informed by Christian morality and biblical law, then adultery, extramarital sex, and potentially even masturbation would be illegal. Freedom of religion wouldn't exist because the U.S. would have declared there was only one God, the Christian God, and everybody had to go to Church on Sunday and no business could be opened. While the Christian morality of the original founders and their immediate successors definitely informed their thinking about U.S. law, U.S. law clearly didn't completely follow Christian morality. And if America is no longer a Christian nation, this point is moot.

Do you see the problem here? You don't define what is being drawn, you just say the drawing is a drawing. A drawing of what? It is drawn "blank"--fill in the blank for me.

I can't define a non-existent drawing. It could be a drawing of anything. On the other hand, it doesn't necessarily matter what its a drawing of; its merely a drawing all the same.

This is a strawman. I'm not saying they're real, they're obviously not since they're just lines on paper, but no, it's not entirely dependent on the artist. People are able to see what is depicted for themselves.

And people can be wrong. Once again, we live in a world where obviously adult characters are called "lolis" and people who find them attractive "lolicons". Art is ultimately subject to interpretation and everyone's particular interpretation may be different. And the artist's interpretation may not line up with the audience's interpretation. So whose interpretation carries more weight?

Is there some grey area, sure, the age of a character can be ambiguous, but there's plenty of times it's not.

That's the problem. There will always be ambiguity and a grey area because its art, and interpretation is part an parcel of it. When it comes to real child pornography, there is no ambiguity. A real child was made to carry out pornographic acts. No need to mince words about what is being shown. With art, how you choose to interpret it is half the problem and makes any clear, objective application of any law impossible.

If you're really concerned about one person banning something based on personal dislike, then you could take it to a vote.

No, I don't think I will subject my freedoms to a popular vote, thank you. That's why the United States has a Bill of Rights; because they considered personal freedom above the mere fickleness and unreliableness of something as uncontrollable as democracy. I'm sure if we put the continued existence of this website up to popular vote, a majority of people would vote to take it down. Thankfully, its not up them.

You're arguing canon, I'm arguing physical depiction.

You can't simply ignore canon; its part and parcel of the character. Its what defines who they are. This is why any law on the subject would be unreliable.

You'd have an easier time with this line of argument choosing more abstract art styles, like Shin Chan or Power Puff Girls, where the designs are only roughly humanoid, and I'd be more inclined to agree, but nobody sees an image of Goku and reasonably perceives it as childish anatomy:

This is why a law banning lolicon would not work; you are getting into the weeds of art styles, but that shouldn't matter. The law has to be clear, concise, and objectively equally applied. That's impossible to do in the world of artwork.

So you've conceded that public perception matters, people can see it's not a harmless apple but a sexualized drawing of something other than an apple.

The only thing I conceded was that handing a child a pornographic drawing was illegal in most countries. I already conceded that nobody would call the drawing an apple here:

An apple has a objective appearance. A drawing of an apple is identifiable as an apple, even if its not based on any particular apple. A loli character, however, is only identifiable as human. That doesn't make it anything else. It isn't necessarily a child; there are plenty of childlike, petite fully grown women in the world today who aren't children, and there are plenty of lolis who also aren't children.

Yes people could identify a drawing as that of an apple based on their acknowledgement of what an apple is in real life. Of course, the artist can then turn around, reveal that the drawing is part of larger comic and the "apple" isn't an apple at all, it just looks like an apple in that one picture; that is the power of art. Lolis are far harder to define because, once again, that term doesn't refer to a specific age of character, but to a drawing aesthetic, art style, or character archetype. It is far less harder to define than a mere apple.

And people can perceive the intended age of a character rather easily with little to no debate as long as the art style is at least semi-realistic, which is the point I'm making.

And as I said, people's perceptions can be wrong.

Sure, but there's no woman who looks like this character in the arms of the brunette, wouldn't you agree?

In real life, probably not. But in artwork, sure. There would be nothing stopping you from doing that.

So it'd be obscene, and even a vote would determine the same results, that's what.

If all it took to establish something as obscene would be a vote, then anything could be declared obscene.

If they aren't human then it's different, if you're depicting a furry, robot, or monster then you're no longer depicting a human and it's an entirely separate argument.

And yet you seem to take umbrage with the 3000 year old loli vampire argument, even though it is a "monster" by definition. And we both know that any potential laws on the subject would lack that kind of nuance. The point is that it isn't really a separate argument; its all artwork at the end of the day. Its all the same. There is no real objective difference.

Nobody is trying to protect fictional kids, it is just a matter of morality, it's a question of what societal norms and standards we should uphold.

And what norms should we uphold? That we ban artwork just because it offends our personal sensibilities? That our rights should be subject to a popular vote?

Having an entirely amoral society encourages undesirable behavior in society which effects everyone.

Society's morality is not controlled or motivated by the law. If society is becoming amoral, it is because society collectively has decided to shift its own morality based on a number of factors. Child pornography is already illegal, but it seems more pervasive on the internet now than it ever has been. Homosexuality used to culturally disparaged and sodomy was illegal. In less than 20 years, there has been a massive shift in people's perception of it, and it had really nothing to do with law changes.