the new world of 2011

[davemerrill]

hipsterdad's father passed away this morning. It had been a long struggle with a lot of battles but he got to raise some heck (and some kids, and some grandkids) along the way. Still kind of processing the news. We got to see him when we were in Atlanta and I'm glad I got to speak to him one last time. He was one of a kind, and the world is poorer without him.

We rang in the new year at a party at Sandra & Brett's that we got an invite to courtesy theengineer. Crowded house full of books and people and drinks and food, Shain saw some friends she hadn't seen in a while, we talked with Donald and David, and Janet had just returned from Costa Rica with side trips to Panama and Nicarauga, so that was interesting, and we had a good time and didn't stay out too late.

YOUR TOKYO BILL 156 UPDATE
Spent a good deal of time yesterday digging through boxes of old Animanga APAs trying to find a thing tohoscope posted way back, oh, 20 years ago. Dan Kanemitsu is the point man for the current reports of Bill 156, but this isn't the first time he's pushed the panic button about the coming doujin apocalypse. What I eventually found was his 16 page essay dealing with the nightmare of Feb. 24 1991, when the Tokyo Metropolitian Police raided several bookstores that were selling obscene doujinshi. The word "doujinshi" wasn't in American fan parlance at the time so the abbreviation "JAC" (for 'Japanese amateur comic') was used. It's an interesting if rambling article that frequently describes the situation as "a nightmare" and is helpfully if sensationally titled "Black February". Rumors of artists being investigated by the police, that the police have been investigating Comiket in plainclothes and will be back to start making arrests at the next Comiket - and as the article says, "it is a well known fact that if any one who is a participants (sp) of the COMIC MARKET is arrested by the police there would be no more COMIC MARKETs in the future." Naturally the printing houses that produce JACs are frightened and have already cancelled many orders. Erotic comics were being classified as "hazardous material", creators were being asked to tone down their more explicit works, and most frightening, a bill was being introduced in the Diet that would differentiate between works intended for adults only and works intended for a general audience.

The article lays out two scenarios; one, that bookstores refuse to carry adults-only doujinshi and the doujinshi market changes drastically. Two, that the official recognition of adults-only doujinshi allows creators to work in the field without fear that their material will be read by anyone but adults. (I think we know which of these two scenarios came to pass. There's an entire floor of doujinshi in Mandarake that I can't un-see which proves it.)

In short, this current Bill 156 isn't the first time that adult comics have come under legal scrutiny in Japan. What's happening now isn't nearly as drastic as what happened in 1991 - for instance, police raids in Shibuya and Kanda haven't taken place, and I don't believe the cops are busting people at the current Comiket. At least nobody's twittering about it. As we all know, after the "nightmare" of "Black February" 1991, the Comic Market kept going for the next 20 years. Doujinshi continued to be printed and sold. Doujinshi artists have continued to use the medium to create works of world-stunning depravity. I can't help but compare his '91 work to what Kanemitsu is writing now - the narrative is more coherent but there's an alarmist sky-is-fallling tone that we didn't quite swallow in 1991, and we find it equally hard to swallow now.