It's not often we discuss politics around here. In fact, we don't discuss them at all. I did once do an article about idiots linking video games to gun violence, but that was a one-off. This time around, we're discussing Japanese law. More specifically, Criminal Code 175, the law demanding the censorship of porn.
Taro Yamada, a member of the House of Councilors who has a pretty fun-looking YouTube account, is working with various agencies like the police to legalize uncensored 2D and live action porn. With a bit of google translate, you can read about that HERE. Yamada is definitely one of us, having voiced opposition to censorship in anime, manga, and gaming when he was running for his current post, which can be seen HERE. A politican who gives two wits about censorship in anime, manga, and gaming is amazing, and of course he'd be from Japan.
In a tweet thread from On Takahashi, the CEO of Irodori Comics discusses the current state of things regarding the law, the struggle it would be to get uncensored hentai, and whether or not companies would actually take advantage of it to put out uncensored hentai. You can read the thread HERE, and the first part below, because it's 25 posts and I'm not putting up 25 tweets.
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Let's be honest here, this will be an uphill battle, and Takahashi outlines exactly why. Take a look at Tokyo Mirage Session #fe. On the Wii U, the western release was censored while the original Japanese version was not. In the Encore release for the Switch, it was censored everywhere, even in Japan. That's not a good sign. Fortunately, the backlash was so bad, Nintendo offered refunds for digital pre-orders in Japan, which you can see HERE. Either way, let's be hopeful for change, but prepared for everything to remain the same.
Now, why should people in the west care? If uncensored anime, manga, games, and hentai can come to Japan, there's hope that it can reach the west. If not, we can always import uncensored stuff like before. It'll be easier to get our hands on uncensored stuff either way.
