Time to start scrubbing those hard drives, kids. A recent article over at GamesPolitics suggests that owners of the controversial hentai title, RapeLay, could be found guilty of possessing child pornography in US courts.
This stems from a recent decision by the 4th US District Court of Appeals where the court refused to hear the appeal of Dwight Whorley of Virginia. While Whorley was convicted for possession of very real pornography of very real children, he was also charged on account of owning manga which depicted children and animals engaged in sexual acts.
Under the 2003 PROTECT Act, owning visual depictions of minors engaged in sexual activity -- regardless of the medium used or if the minor in question even exists -- can be considered a federal crime. Now, this may tempered by whether or not the item can be considered to have artistic or scientific value but it could all fall under that most mysterious of legal terms and be labeled "obscene." You know, whichever way works for the judge.
Under such guidelines, it is not outside the realm of possibility that the game be considered child pornography in the United States. The logical leap would not be an extreme one for a district attorney to go from hentai to hentai games to something like RapeLay. Since the entire plot of the game centers around raping a mother and her two underage daughters, I'm sure you'd have to dig deeper than an oil drill to convince an American judge of its artistic merits.
Conrad Zimmerman is Destructoid's News Editor and home to the busiest mustache in the gaming press. An amateur historian and pop culture fanatic, Conrad possesses a nearly limitless wealth of videogame factoids and a passion for the power of games to teach, inspire and entertain. He enjoys reading, writing and turning things which should be fun into work.
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Contest:
12:00 AM on 06.21.2009
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Even manga or anime depicting young children being raped in the most horrifying ways possible is still probably fictional. If such media become illegal, the next thing they'll probably do is outlaw films that depict animals being harmed, even if the film makes it absolutely clear that "No animals were harmed in the making of this film."
I wonder if it would make any difference if hentai or other porn had the disclaimer that "No children were harmed in the making of this [insert medium here]"?
I tried the game, and while it didn't succeed in turning me on very much, it REALLY isn't that bad. Certainly not bad enough to say it is on par with possessing child pornography. That's just insane.
There would be a riot if it led to the banning of a more popular game, though... and my mind is dirty enough to imagine using World of Warcraft to make something like pornography... with gnomes... Um, nevermind...
RapeLay has a plot?
A) your avatar ties that statement together very well.
B) you almost sound hopeful that you'll get to go to prison. But that's just my internal monologue's emphasis.
a fool takes no delight in understanding.
Who, me? Baiting? Yeah, jailbaiting.
*applause*
*cut to a commercial*
The game came out in 2006, it suddenly pops up in amazon and people start raising a stink about it, hell Rapelay is relatively tame considering the kinds of games that come out in Japan, I really fucking the knee-jerk reactions of the U.S.A sometimes.
And simply owning being considering a federal offense sets a terrible precedence and opens up a door of litigation that scare the crap out of me.
Yeah, I can make my excuses.
lol, I was definitely joking. There are some very obvious differences between my comment and a game like rapelay, as well as actual child pornography. And, despite my choice of avatars, I have nothing to worry about.
Well, that's if I owned it..and if that's from the game, those graphics suck lol.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/05/manga-porn/
They convicted this guy who had NO REAL CHILD PORN - JUST LOLI MANGA.
I mean seriously, you can be arrested FOR DRAWINGS!?
I'm not into lolicon, and I think child porn is sick and disgusting as it can ruin a innocent child's life.
But seriously... ARRESTED FOR DRAWINGS! C'mon people... whatever your personal feelings are on the subject matter, as free men and women you have to see that the potential ramifications of this.
Hahaha...you stupid redneck. Fox 'news' is such a fucking travesty.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/00-795.ZS.html
As an aside, I don't make a point of keeping apprised of the latest developments in kiddie porn laws; I'm an attorney. I'll take a look at the opinions later; I'm interested in first amendment issues, so I'll probably end up reading it sooner or later anyway.
Second, this is indeed a disturbing trend. Why? Well, you know the thoery that making porn illegal will drop the number of sexual assault instances in any given community? Opposite is true. The theory that arming citizenry would be a better crime deterant than not arming people? Once again, opposite is true. What you have is a group of sick individuals who, at the moment, are perfectly happy with the lolicon. They get that fantasy, nut, wipe off their chest, and go to work. But take that lolicon away and suddenly you don't have that fantasy release anymore. Logic dictates they'll seek out the real deal. It may be an unhealthy fantasy life but whatever. If letting these people jerk it to FICTIONAL DRAWINGS keeps them from kidnapping and raping an 8 year old girl, FUCK! I'd draw them the stuff myself.
Buckle your seatbelts, everyone. It's gonna get bumpy from here on.
But seriously, like most people in the thread here, I'm worried about the precedent this is gonna set. I mean, you know how I go all extreme and off the deep end with pessimism, but just think about it for a second. As already stated, it could go so far that not even fiction would be safe.
I wonder if they'll start banning children too. :3
ronsauce, go fuck yourself you avatarless bitch.
They'll say, we are doing this in the name of the children, and therefore it is just and unquestionable, and if you question it you hate children etc. This is a very religious like siege mentality. Now its starting to breach into though crime territory, where anyone is fair game, even when they are perfectly innocently enjoying, media that may be questionable to everyday tastes, but again isn't hurting anyone at all.
In todays world, males are usually hung out to dry, as guilty even before trial. It should be interesting when they pick up a female fan, for her yaoi manga and hentai games, because they enjoy that stuff just as much as the male fan do normal hentai. I wonder if a female would end up in jail for the same thing? Would this make her, worth spending tax payers money on to lock up.
I'm with Sheppy. Such media provides an outlet for those that need that outlet, as we aren't all the same. What if they are potentially stamping on something that could stop a lot of people progressing to something worse, involving real kids? Yeah, dammit, give these people mountains of fake drawn shit and there's less of a problem. I think those in power also need to educate themselves about this media properly, before they condemn it, problem is, while those who use it, or have knowledge of it, can take it like it is, and see the ridiculously warped fun side of it, more conservative minds are like... WTF!!
If any yanks own Rapeplay, it will be in dodgy pirate form, anyway. Would it really be worth chasing them for this? If its an illegal download, it shouldn't, but who knows. Would be interesting to see if the games industry would defend such a game in court, though.
"Those in power" are at least a generation or two older than ours. Come on, how many of your grandparents or even parents know how to do half the shit you do involving computers? And as "a series of tubes" describes the Internet...
I'm not sure they fully understand what exactly we're dealing with here. I mean, I understand technology advances quickly, but I'm not sure if anyone is trying to understand. It's not a good idea to turn a blind eye to something because it's difficult to keep up with. What with technology becoming integrated into our daily lives and most households having some form of computer, it's damn necessary for someone to actually know what the hell is going on here. After all, weren't we shitting ourselves ten years ago because of Y2K? As I heard it, the world (or at least the processes that run it) could have ended if it wasn't fixed. Buh?
Anyway, I'll get to the point. Lawmakers are likely going to remain out of touch on these issues and really blow stuff out of proportion like they are now. Yeah, I understand that the game is far from what we'd consider good in a number of ways, but A) it wasn't even rightly sold in America. You had to import it from Japan. Right? And B) what everyone else said about it being better for the person to make use of these materials than pull the real thing.
The problem is, with the bad rap video games have gotten in the press as murder trainers, they'll soon be labeled as rape trainers too. Maybe it'll get to the point where you can go to prison for even owning video games... Oh yes, extreme, but look at the knee-jerk to this and how the trainwreck is piling up.
It can't be good for anyone. But that's just me.
*Cue eye rolling*
but its an amazon so they get a free pass. fucking politicians are getting a check and we get arrested.
i love my land but hate my government and always have.
Thats just the magical work of double standards, though. Its the same reason why rape on tv of a woman by a man is usually played for horror or tragedy, while rape of a male by a woman is considered comedic because the media perception is that males cannot possibly be raped because why would they ever be unwilling to sex a lady no matter how traumatic the circumstances?
Worse, whichever way works for the <I>jury</I>.
Why arrest people for a "crime" that doesn't harm anyone? There's no victim here. There's no victim if you kill someone in a video game. What, am I going to jail for squashing all those virtual Goombas after all these years for genocide??