General Gaming Kotaku pens article with CG child porn images

[Keyser_Soze]

I didn’t really want to hop into this topic because we’ve been down this road before and OP has a very strict view of sex but I would be wary of tossing around the term child porn especially in this situation.

 

Real child porn is of pre pubescent children, probably around 10 or younger.

This particular case was of a fictional character (which already muddies the waters) with the likeness of a real person. But (I had to look up the image in question) it looked like she had reached maturity. Generally artwork like these don’t explicitly state age (in fact you’ll see a lot of Japanese artwork say “Age in appearance”) so unless it looks like a child we don’t assume it is. (Even so sometimes the reverse is true)

So I think some people are making a mountain out of a molehill here, and those wanting her to face jail time, she probably won’t.

[AbsolutSurgen]

3 hours ago, Keyser_Soze said:

Real child porn is of pre pubescent children, probably around 10 or younger.

In Canada, the definition is that it "shows a person who is or is depicted as being under the age of eighteen years".  Clearly, the younger the depiction of the child, the more offensive it would be.

 

3 hours ago, Keyser_Soze said:

This particular case was of a fictional character (which already muddies the waters) with the likeness of a real person. But (I had to look up the image in question) it looked like she had reached maturity. Generally artwork like these don’t explicitly state age (in fact you’ll see a lot of Japanese artwork say “Age in appearance”) so unless it looks like a child we don’t assume it is. (Even so sometimes the reverse is true)

So I think some people are making a mountain out of a molehill here, and those wanting her to face jail time, she probably won’t.

Your point is probably very valid in the U.S.  I suspect US law allows people to watch the kind of movies she did.

Based on Canadian law, the videos that the author describes in the article would qualify as child porn, and under Canadian law, accessing child porn is illegal.  Since she lives in Montreal, she wrote a confession in an article about illegally watching child porn in Canada.  Assuming she is found not to be a threat to anyone under the age of 18, I suspect it would be unlikely that she would be convicted.

There are lots of examples of some Japanese Anime/Manga being considered child porn by police in Canada.

[Jason]

This is the fault of everyone who mocked the efforts to bring ethics to gaming journalism. 

[crispy4000]

5 hours ago, Keyser_Soze said:

I didn’t really want to hop into this topic because we’ve been down this road before and OP has a very strict view of sex but I would be wary of tossing around the term child porn especially in this situation.

 

Real child porn is of pre pubescent children, probably around 10 or younger.

This particular case was of a fictional character (which already muddies the waters) with the likeness of a real person. But (I had to look up the image in question) it looked like she had reached maturity. Generally artwork like these don’t explicitly state age (in fact you’ll see a lot of Japanese artwork say “Age in appearance”) so unless it looks like a child we don’t assume it is. (Even so sometimes the reverse is true)

So I think some people are making a mountain out of a molehill here, and those wanting her to face jail time, she probably won’t.

Since @AbsolutSurgen addressed the law in Canada (where the author resides), I'll address it for the U.S.

 
There is no U.S. law that distinguishes between child pornography at age 10.  Federal child porn law unilaterally involves minors.  You can personally believe whatever you want about what "real" child porn is.  The legal cutoff is still 18.

 

Illustrated or computer generated images of minors having sex typically falls under the Protect Act.  When there is legal recourse, it concerns both the distribution and obscenity of the material rather than child porn law directly.  It's still resulted in jail time and fines in the past, but not to the same degree.

Under the Protect Act, it would need to be discerned that an ordinary person would view it as an animated depiction of a minor having sex.  That's the true litmus test.  Not puberty alone, but are they 18+.  Hermione is depicted as 11-17 in both the source material and in the pornographic take.  And it's not just her either.  Ron's there.

 

But yeah, the writer also lives in Canada, where the laws on this are tougher.

[Keyser_Soze]

I'm aware of all that thank you.

[Duderino]

Whatever your opinion of the law is, I think it's safe to say that Kotaku crossed a moral line here for many.

[CayceG]

Kotaku responds:

 

https://kotaku.com/an-apology-1838490733

 

 

[crispy4000]

 

Quote

For this story, I wish we’d taken that more rigorous approach. From the comments under the article, it’s clear that’s what many of you said you expected. For example, what does it mean that these parody videos about these particular franchises, many of which feature teenage characters and whose source material is geared towards young audiences, are so popular on websites like PornHub, some with more than 700,000 views?

How about an investigation into the legality of PornHub, a Canadian company, hosting this content under that country's juristiction?

You could talk about how there's a user flagging system and the content is user hosted.  Unlike a certain website that put cg child porn in their editorial.  You could probably criticize them both for turning a blind eye to it.  That would be an interesting comparative case study.

 

Polygon should run it.

[darkness35]

Looks like Kotaku's revenue increased for the next few days.

[Reputator]

There's stupid, and then there's Kotaku stupid.