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NEWS: Australia Bans Import, Sales of 3 'No Game, No Life' Novels


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ErikaD.D



Joined: 09 Jun 2019
Posts: 660
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 1:37 am Reply with quote
I thought Australia is a democratic country? Banning import and sales of some mangas/novels sounds like China.
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Scion Drake



Joined: 25 Nov 2017
Posts: 959
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 1:40 am Reply with quote
Wait their banning only 3 specific volumes? That’s just really stupid. I mean your gonna ban something, ban it entirely then. Like why the Hell would I read volume 2 if I can’t read volume one, it’s pointless.

Man I feel bad for Australians.
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Mavado



Joined: 17 Jul 2017
Posts: 85
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 1:41 am Reply with quote
Quote:
describe or depict in a way that is likely to cause offence to a reasonable adult
Press "X" to doubt.

I'll admit that I haven't read the light novels myself, but I very much doubt the people responsible for this ban qualify as "Reasonable Adults".
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Marzan



Joined: 29 Mar 2009
Posts: 518
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 1:41 am Reply with quote
Wait till they discover the Monogatari series. Shinobu is going to give them a heart attack.
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Greboruri



Joined: 09 Jul 2003
Posts: 387
Location: QBN, NSW, Australia
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 1:43 am Reply with quote
The applicant was Centre Alliance, which is Senator Stirling Griff's party. Not sure why you aren't reporting this. Generally the Classification Board does not classify books. Unless a lobby group, a political party or the Australian Federal Police submits the book themselves.
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ErikaD.D



Joined: 09 Jun 2019
Posts: 660
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 1:45 am Reply with quote
Marzan wrote:
Wait till they discover the Monogatari series. Shinobu is going to give them a heart attack.

And probably Chainsaw Man. But I wonder will Australia ban Chainsaw Man too, because the manga is more darker and it has violence, blood and gore.
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SunsetYesterday



Joined: 18 Oct 2019
Posts: 7
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 2:24 am Reply with quote
Is there anything actually objectionable in the novels that could be the reason for this decision or is it just moral panic about lolicon? I don't remember anything that could be considered "high impact/morally objectionable" in the anime besides the usual fanservice you can find in almost every light novel adaptation.
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harminia



Joined: 24 Aug 2015
Posts: 2048
Location: australia
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 2:44 am Reply with quote
Scion Drake wrote:
Wait their banning only 3 specific volumes? That’s just really stupid. I mean your gonna ban something, ban it entirely then. Like why the Hell would I read volume 2 if I can’t read volume one, it’s pointless.


Because they classify by volume, not by overall series. Only these volumes have the restricted content, while the others do not. For example, a show could be rated PG for 9/10 of its volumes, but the 10th volume could be rated MA15+.

ErikaD.D wrote:

And probably Chainsaw Man. But I wonder will Australia ban Chainsaw Man too, because the manga is more darker and it has violence, blood and gore.

No. That's a completely different issue. The classification board is EXTREMELY strict on child sexualisation and on sexual abuse. In the case of NGNL, it has quite a bit of content with sexualised children, so that's why they're clamping down on this
Violent content generally wouldn't get refused classification unless it also involves other themes i.e. sexual abuse

Quote:
The political party Centre Alliance applied for these novel volumes' classification.

I find this interesting because I thought the distributor of the content was the one in charge of getting it approved, I wasn't aware unrelated groups could get stuff classified. I guess maybe governmental groups can...
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Lann



Joined: 12 Dec 2006
Posts: 274
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 3:07 am Reply with quote
Its about time time stuff like this was regulated. It might be okay in Japans culture, but hardly for the western markets. In the 90s, Viz (and maybe others) simply got around this issue by editing the images to cover up the girls. Its time to go back to this model of practice.
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Errinundra
Moderator


Joined: 14 Jun 2008
Posts: 6583
Location: Melbourne, Oz
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 3:28 am Reply with quote
ErikaD.D wrote:
I thought Australia is a democratic country? Banning import and sales of some mangas/novels sounds like China.


At the risk of heading off-topic, democracy =/= freedom of speech. Well, not necessarily. One is a system of government; the other is a principle, albeit associated with democracies more often than with communist governments. If the majority of voters in a democracy want to censor the depiction of sexualised anime characters, then it is right and proper for the government to introduce laws to implement their wishes. I'm comfortable with that - so long as the opportunity remains for the laws to be repealed if voters have a change of heart.

Specifically on Australia, it's interesting to compare it with the US. The Economist Intelligent Unit's Democracy Index scores Australia at 9.09/10 (full democracy) while the US scores 7.96 (flawed democracy), even though Australia has much tougher libel and defamation laws, courts have more power to make orders suppressing information (think George Pell's court cases) and censorship being more restrictive (though it is much laxer than ANN readers are inclined to believe).


Last edited by Errinundra on Tue Aug 11, 2020 3:33 am; edited 1 time in total
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nargun



Joined: 29 Mar 2006
Posts: 930
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 3:32 am Reply with quote
harminia wrote:
I find this interesting because I thought the distributor of the content was the one in charge of getting it approved, I wasn't aware unrelated groups could get stuff classified. I guess maybe governmental groups can...


Anyone can apply, from memory. It's years since I worked with this stuff, though, and my focus was elsewhere.

There was a film where there were reports that what was presented as simulated sexual assault of a minor actually involved an on-camera sexual assault of a minor. Can't remember which one. Anyway, I wrote in and suggested, "hey, if these reports are true then it's actual sexual violence on film and needs to be RC; do you think you might want to, you know, look at it?" But they blew me off, of course. Not being a senator does that to you.
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IceLeaf



Joined: 08 Sep 2019
Posts: 146
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 4:49 am Reply with quote
SunsetYesterday wrote:
Is there anything actually objectionable in the novels that could be the reason for this decision or is it just moral panic about lolicon? I don't remember anything that could be considered "high impact/morally objectionable" in the anime besides the usual fanservice you can find in almost every light novel adaptation.


From what I can remember there was nothing really objectionable in the volumes in the text but they might have disagreed with the images in the volumes
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TheMorry



Joined: 08 May 2014
Posts: 660
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 5:13 am Reply with quote
Lol so stupid. What do they think they will achieve with this? If they dont want taxes on selling this products it's their loss. As a Dutch person who is immgrating to Australia in the near future: ill buy anything i want legally or illegally. Import is your best friend.

Australia should rather focus on important matters: their underwhelming economic position.
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Thespacemaster



Joined: 03 Mar 2012
Posts: 1167
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 5:34 am Reply with quote
Look on one hand i can see it is a bit redundant to ban just a select books from a series and leave it at that, on the other hand, i can somewhat agree that those front images look a little to provocative. ( yes it is based on a fictional characther, but it is still depicting what is suppose to be a kid character sexually)

Best solution i think is provide alternate covers which would be less provocative, that way it will satisfy both the censorship but also leave the entire series still available to read instead of having parts banned.
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EnigmaticSky



Joined: 06 Aug 2011
Posts: 750
PostPosted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 5:52 am Reply with quote
Quote:
publications that "describe, depict, express or otherwise deal with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that they offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults to the extent that they should not be classified

So none of the good stuff lmao

In all seriousness, "standards of morality" vary, and it's important to explore somewhat edgy themes in media. That being said, the way Shiro was sexualized in the anime was really uncomfortable for me. I think the anime is great, but it's so [expletive] creepy seeing a panty shot of the dude's little sister.
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