The US subsidiary of top Japanese bookstore Kinokuniya has stopped all sales of popular anime pin-up magazines, saying it thinks the innocent pictures of anime girls they are famous for may contain “illegal and inappropriate content” – or in other words, that it thinks they might be considered child porn in the US.
The store has cancelled the subscriptions of all customers subscribed to the magazines, which includes fan favourites Megami and Nyan-Type.
Earlier this month subscribers of Megami Magazine through Kinokuniya Bookstores of America received this rather distressing letter from the popular Japanese book retailer:
July 7th, 2010
(subscriber name/address redacted)
Dear Subscriber,
Thank you very much for using the Kinokuniya magazine subscription services.
We are writing this letter to inform you that we no longer handle subscriptions to Megami magazine since it has recently come to our attention that the magazine may contain inappropriate contents which may not comply with applicable local, state, and/or federal regulations.
It is our policy to take a cautious approach in conducting our business in full compliance with any applicable local, state, and/or federal regulations. In keeping with this policy, we will cancel your subscription to this publication.
Please accept the enclosed refund check for the portion of the subscription remaining.
Thanks again for your continuous patronage to our business.
Should you have any questions or concern regarding this matter, please contact me below.
Sincerely,
(name redacted)
Kinokuniya Bookstores of America Co., LTD.
A follow-up call to the store revealed that five moe-style magazines were currently affected by the ban: Megami, Megami Deluxe, Nyan Type, Dengeki Hime, and Dengeki Moeoh.
None of these titles carry explicit nudity or sexual content – only doe-eyed anime maidens in great profusion.
The store contact avoided giving any precise reasons or specific content which led to the sudden ban, and was quick to offer reassurances that magazines already previously sold by their store and available for subscription over the last decade were not ever “illegal” in any respect.
When it was pointed out that other anime and manga sellers in the US still offer these magazines for sale or subscription, the contact apologized and explained that this was a “precautionary measure… due to certain recent events and changes” – a possible allusion to the Handley case.
A search of the web reveals that non-subscribing direct buyers will also find that the store no longer carried their monthly dose of moe pin-up goodness on their shelves.
Whether US Customs was an issue or not was not clarified (although other retailers have long shipped them without issue), but the contact admitted there had been customer complaints regarding the content of the magazines.
Meanwhile, Megami, Nyan-Type and other anime pin-up magazine subscriptions still remain available through less spineless retailers, both in the US and beyond.
Anime fans opposed to rampant censorship with no basis in law are advised not to support so craven a company as Kinokuniya in future.
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AHA!, Laws you never know when they are going to be applied, they never exist and then, they appear.
Laws are moot. There will always be ways around them.
ie: You can get questionable doujinshi at the dealers' tables at your local anime convention.
How they manage to import such items is beyond me. (But I'm not complaining).
yes, you can get those things at dealers tables, that's the problem, now you can't import something that has a drawed lady in a maid outfit, so, you shouldn't be able to import porn as well (It hurts to think about it).
ie: Those ways around them can be used on your benefit as well.
@dante0397
I think you missed my point. When I said "questionable doujinshi", I meant doujinshi that are ALREADY illegal in North America (ie. loli doujinshi).
So my point being, if illegal doujishi are already being imported and made available at local anime conventions, then it doesn't matter what else they deem "illegal".
As long as the end-user gets their product, nothing else matters.
The problem is that they are illegal and legal at the same time. 1 law says no children drawn or not, another says it's alright if they are drawn. US can be retarded most of the time.
Disappointing, kinda cowardly I think. Sure, they're at risk by selling it but why not contact Neil Gaiman and his CBLDF and prepare a defense ahead of time? That way, you get a revolutionary victory at no expense and it attracts loads of attention for your store.
Megami Magazine is pure gold! What a bunch of spineless bastards...
We need a spiky haired blue suited pointing finger lawyer to restore order! This is madness!
Another reason why US sucks!
Another reason why you should live somewhere else in Asia (except Korea)
lol I ordered 3 posters from our copy shop of kodomo no jikan and black rock shooter. They are all DFC.
Holy...crap...
Megami-magazine is as squeaky clean as a pin-up magazine can EVER get, East or West.
*sigh* I guess the paranoid-pedo wagon strikes again. I wish people stop being so quick to jump on.
Also: Who the fuck would complain about Megami of all things...?
Femnazis? Fags? Femnazi fags? Oh, and manginas.
Trust me, fags have no problems with anime pinup girls.
This particular fag is as confused (and annoyed) about this random censorship as anyone else.
People who complain about them is most likely the "Naive Adults"
Fag here i like megami i think it's cute.
I think Fag is a pretty cool guy, he likes megami and doesn't afraid of anything.
Fuck American conservatives.
It's the liberals that are in control now, and it makes you wonder why sales in americans suck.
I dare you to say that after November if all the cons get in the house.
Nothing will change.
Yep. "Liberals" and "conservatives" in America are all the same, at least on this sort of issue. If you asked the most right-wing and the most leftist members of Congress about this issue, I doubt you'd see any substantive disagreement between them. This isn't a liberal vs. conservative issue, it's a public perception issue. The public perceives stuff like this to be child porn (mostly because the media, who make their living on scandals, tell them it is), so even if it doesn't meet the legal standard (which it doesn't, and I guarantee that Kinokuniya's lawyers KNOW it doesn't), the retailer would rather avoid the bad PR that would follow if a media outlet caught wind of what they were selling.
This isn't about fear of being sued, any more than the decision to cancel publication of Kodomo no Jikan in the U.S. was about that: this is about not getting bad press. KnJ is perfectly legal, and so are Megami and Nyan-Type, but the problem lies in that a single media accusation of selling "child porn" would inevitably lead to a massive boycott. As such, the income from selling these things isn't worth the risk - it's simple economics.
Damn, this guy above me deserves an internet for that post. Well said, my good man!
Actually I think the true difference on this issue between cons and libs is that feminist libs may be partly to blame, but the conservative outlook could care less about the subjectification of women issue. They tend to side more with fighting pornography and abuse of children conservatives are always fearmongering about.
united states of america: the country of liberty and freedom
Liberty and freedom indeed...
*scoffs*
Fuck...it's better than being in China, or one of those middle eastern countries..
Just so you know, in Singapore we ban all sorts of crap including bubble gum. But we can buy Megami, Newtype, and even the naughtier ecchi ones long as we show proof of age.
US needs to work harder.
yeah, the more laws both sides pass.. the worse its going to get.. but in reality.. where does one go from here? Europe? hell no, Australia.. hell no, new zealand.. Maybe... Japan love to visit.. but no... as a saying goes, if America fails.. where do we go for freedom then??
The country of liberty and freedom (Mostly applied to the White people)
The worst form of censorship is self-censorship.
Yeah, f*** those guys!
anime its tunring more and more in child porn instead of great stories, i pity the new mangakas.
I hate how they wont give you a straight answer, rather frustrating.
Their position: "We've definitely not done anything illegal but we think we might have."
Oh, which one is it then? :D
i think it's more of a
"we're afraid to be sued, even if we haven't done anything wrong..."
cause any case that has child porn in it is almost always a loss either true or not
You'd think they'd do some research before asuming their stuff "might" have child porn. They certainly don't seem to have any backbone....
Having ideals or "a backbone" is irrelevant for a company, BlaqCat. The potential loss outweights the potential gain, because the risk is too high, just as Anon said.
They are afraid to be sued? All the subscribers should sue them, for breach of a contract.
@Schrobby: with you there, man. meanwhile i'm worried that Kinokuniya Singapore might have shared thoughts...
"well, thats fine.... i'll just get it elsewhere."
so they get in for the money and run out from the sueing madness, truly spineless
That's ridiculously stupid, i feel really bad for the people having subscriptions there...
Good thing i'm receiving my Megami directly from Japan :)
But they still carry manga like Yubisaki Milk Tea, Berserk, and Ikki Tousen, right?
If they still do, a few complaints should see them forced to stop.
Don't they measure x against y though? I mean, if I'm in business and recieve 20 complaints vs like 150 subscriptions, I'll definitely stick with the 150, and give a "you don't -have- to read what you don't like" response to the 20.
Complaints are powerful - way more powerful than people think.
If you don't react, the person who complained to you will perhaps complain to your boss or someone higher up, and if that happens, you will most likely have your ass kicked. Nothing to ROW ROW FIGHT THE POWER about.
I know that people who are complaining all the time are annoying as hell, but sometimes, it's actually a very powerful tool to get what you want.
That excludes complaining on the internets, like the thing we do here on SanCom. It's necessary and justified and I do it too, but still, it's mostly circle-jerking. If you want to actually change something, you need to write to the publisher.
It's the US... you can sue anything for anything with anything. That's why even 20 complaints may lead to 20 law-suits... hurray for the nation of freedom!
really need to stop these frivolous lawsuits.. they should have 1 judge that looks at all lawsuits, something like night court (tv, old old tv) where they do back to back cases. and if the suit is deemed it frivolous, all court costs should be payed by the complainer including lawyer cost of the other party...
that should stop an number of these stupid things to acctual complaints...
all these moral fags just just shut up, and not read the things that offend them... if its a tv show.. change the damn chanel.. magazine.. don't read it etc etc, and leave them to the people that enjoy them!!
I used to work as a bellboy for a condo building, and believe me people complained ALL the time about shit, but if it was a complaint about protocol, we kindly directed them to our boss. Then the boss approaches us about the complaint, we explain WHY changing protocol would be a negative (positives outweighed by negs), and the complaint would be voided unless a large majority (of residents) agreed with the complaint. The opposite was also true.
This is the way Kinokuniya should have done things as it's what worked best, and pisses less people off (generally).
Just one complain form some certain person will be more than enough, as for the rest wherever they are like it or not isn't much important.
They still carry Kodomo no Jiakn as far as i know too.
Not much longer, I guess...
Noooo, they can't ban that as well D:
I take the bus to Kinokuniya quite often; it'll be terrible if they start banning manga due to paranoia. Hopefully Book-Off won't follow in their steps. (last time I checked they were carrying series such as Chocotto Sister, quite ecchi loli stuff)