Category: Press Releases

FIGHT FOR YOUR FREEDOM!

Support CBLDF With The Industry’s Greatest Creators in CBLDF LIBERTY ANNUAL 2011 from Image Comics!

United We Stand Against Censorship! That’s the message from Image Comics, over two dozen of the industry’s greatest creators, and our friends at DC Comics and Marvel Comics, who have all banded together to deliver the greatest CBLDF benefit comic yet — CBLDF LIBERTY ANNUAL 2011!

Famed comics editor Bob Schreck, Editor-in-Chief of Legendary Comics, and Assistant Editor Greg Tumbarello view censorship as the ultimate form of bullying and have gathered an all-star team of comics creators to tell powerful stories that take a stand against censorship. CBLDF LIBERTY ANNUAL 2011 comprises 48 powerful pages of all new stories and art. The proceeds from the sale of the book benefit the ever-important First Amendment work of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

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Bonfire Agency Launches CBLDF’s First Consumer Advertising Campaign

With the recent announcement of CBLDF’s Canada Customs Case, CBLDF gained a valuable new partner in the fight for Free Speech: Bonfire Agency. Bonfire, a firm specializing in pop culture marketing, took on the heady task of helping CBLDF reach out to supporters with the first consumer advertising campaign in CBLDF’s history.

To support CBLDF’s defense of free speech, you can make a donation or become a member. Thanks to Bonfire, you can also run print ads, post a banner on your website, or provide an informative pamphlet to your customers. Download the print ad here. You can also download several sizes of animated or flat banners: 160 x 600 banner (swf or gif), 300 x 250 banner (swf or gif), or 728 x 90 banner (swf or gif). Finally, the pamphlet is available for download here.
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The CBLDF and TFAW Announce Third Annual SDCC Autograph Card / CBLDF Auction Event

For the past two years, Things From Another World (TFAW) and the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund (CBLDF) have teamed up with comics professionals, such as Jim Lee, Charlie Adlard, Philip Tan and more, to help raise more than $60,000 for the annual CBLDF auction at San Diego Comic-Con. Now, TFAW and CBLDF are proud to announce their Third Annual SDCC Autograph Card/CBLDF Auction event!

As in years past, TFAW is asking artists to create original sketches to donate to the CBLDF auction at San Diego Comic-Con. However, this year, Marvel and DC Comics have generously agreed to allow artists to use their proprietary characters in these CBLDF sketches!

Cryptozoic Entertainment Launches Free Digital Comics App, Benefitting CBLDF

We first teamed up with Cryptozoic Entertainment to create the CBLDF Liberty Trading Cards, with proceeds going to the Fund. We’re taking a second step in our partnership and our shared dedication to Free Speech as Cryptozoic enters the world of digital publishing. Cryptozoic has launched a comic reader with top-quality content for the iPad™, iPhone™, and iPod Touch™, with a percentage of the profits dedicated to benefit CBLDF.

To celebrate the exclusive release of Blizzard™ manga on the Cryptozoic Comics app, Cryptozoic is offering a free download of the full 160-page manga, Warcraft: Legends Vol. 1, for the first week of its release (through June 2nd)!

CBLDF Invites You to the 2011 BOOK EXPO AMERICA MEMBER PARTY!

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund is having a membership party to kick off Book Expo America, and we want you to be a part of it! Sponsored by IDW, the CBLDF Book Expo Welcome Mixer happens this Tuesday, May 24!

The CBLDF is inviting the book industry out for a welcome mixer on Tuesday, May 24, 2011. Publishing professionals, booksellers, librarians, and creators are all invited to kick off BEA. The party is free for all BEA attendees and NYC comics and book professionals and retailers!

Alex Cox Joins CBLDF As Development Manager

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund is excited to announce the addition of Alex Cox to the New York office staff, in the position of Development Manager. Alex comes to the organization with fifteen years experience working as a comics retailer in New York City, including opening and managing his own store, ROCKETSHIP. As Development Manager, Alex will oversee the organization’s development activities, including fundraising at conventions, online, and at events throughout the United States. He will also coordinate volunteers for events and conventions, and for assistance in the New York office.

CBLDF & Dark Horse Cheer Free Speech Victory in Ninth Circuit!


The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and Dark Horse Comics applaud a decision issued by United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit holding that two Oregon statutes that criminalize distributing sex education and other non-obscene materials to minors are unconstitutional in violation of the First Amendment. The State of Oregon argued that the statutes applied only to “hardcore pornography,” but the Ninth Circuit found that they applied to much more, including Kentaro Miura’s manga “Berserk,” Judy Blume’s “Forever,” and Margaret Atwood’s “A Handmaid’s Tale.” The plaintiffs did not challenge Oregon’s existing law making it a crime to contact a minor with the intent of having sexual contact. CBLDF and Dark Horse were among the plaintiff group challenging the statutes.

Mike Richardson, publisher of plaintiff Dark Horse comics says, “We were extremely happy to see these statutes overturned. Our Constitution’s First Amendment was intended to keep the hands of the government off the printing presses of America. Creators everywhere can breath a sigh of relief that these laws, open to interpretation and likely to be abused, have been put down.”

Full announcement and text of decision follow the jump!

Comic Book Legal Defense Fund Urges Supreme Court to Reject New Restrictions on Speech in Video Game Censorship Case


Comic Book Legal Defense Fund today filed a friend-of-the-court brief in Schwarzenegger v. EMA, urging the Supreme Court to affirm the Ninth Circuit’s decision that a California law banning the sale or rental of any video game containing violent content to minors, and requiring manufacturers to label such games, is unconstitutional.

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund submits that, if allowed to stand, California’s law would reverse fundamental First Amendment principles by creating a new category of unprotected speech, diminishing the First Amendment rights of minors, and reducing First Amendment protection for new media. The CBLDF argues that the law under review is the most recent example of government improperly attempting to regulate content by using junk science, and calls upon a history of moral panics against media that includes the 1950s crusades against comics that crippled the industry and harmed the art form. The CBLDF asks the Supreme Court to deny California this attempt to roll back protections guaranteed by the First Amendment, as it and other courts have correctly done in the past.

Read on for the full release, and brief.

CBLDF Joins Challenge To Alaska Censorship Law

CBLDF joins a coalition of organizations and local booksellers filing suit to block a broad Alaska censorship law that bans constitutionally protected speech on the Internet on topics including contraception and pregnancy, sexual health, literature, and art and also threatens retailers of books, magazines, movies and other media.

Signed in May by Governor Parnell and effective July 1, the law, Section 11.61.128 of the Alaska Statutes, imposes two severe restrictions on the distribution of constitutionally protected speech on the Internet and in book and video stores and libraries. The law could make anyone who operates a website or communicates through a listserv criminally liable for nudity or sexually related material, if the material can be considered “harmful to minors” under the law’s definition. In effect, it bans from the Internet anything that may be “harmful to minors,” including material adults have a First Amendment right to view. Also, a bookseller, video retailer, or librarian can be prosecuted if he or she is unaware that it contains nudity or sexual content and unknowingly sells, rents, or loans a book, video, magazine or other media to a minor whether online or in a brick and mortar location. Violators of either part of the law can be sentenced to up to two years in prison, must register as sex offenders and could be forced to forfeit their business.