In 2011, the National Assembly of South Korea revised laws surrounding child pornography to cover materials featuring “creations of persons who can be perceived as minors” in sexual situations, expanding the definition of illegal practices to include the perceptions of…
Category: Legal
Violent Content Research Act Raises Free Speech Concerns
Video games, the latest scapegoat in the war against gun violence, are being faced with yet another attempt to stifle their First Amendment rights. As a result of the Sandy Hook massacre and other recent tragedies, a new act is…
The Inconvenience of Barefoot Gen
Translator and manga industry expert Dan Kanemitsu submitted the following opinion piece on the recent ban of Barefoot Gen from the perspective of being close to the ground in recent battles involving manga regulation in Japan. In December of 2010,…
Obscenity Case Files: Smith v. California
It was established in Roth v. United States that the freedom of speech would not extend to materials that were considered obscene. But what happens to a book store that unknowingly carries books that contain obscene material? Is a book…
Supreme Court Justices Played Video Games During Brown v. EMA
At 53, Elena Kagan is the youngest member of the U.S. Supreme Court. Kagan recently spoke in Providence, Rhode Island, and Michelle R. Smith with Talking Points Memo wrote about Kagan’s comments on how the Court uses technology. Kagan admitted…
Sen. Feinstein Seeks to Restrict Federal Definition of “Real” Journalism
Congressional efforts to pass a federal Media Shield Law, which would introduce additional protections for journalists from government interference and surveillance, are being stymied as the U.S. Senate tries to solve a question of definition: Who do we consider “real”…
Syria Continues Campaign Against Dissenting Artists
A cartoonist who co-signed a 2011 document calling for the removal of Syrian President Bashir al-Assad and his government was arrested in late July, one more in an ongoing string of arrests, harassment, and disappearances of dissenting Syrian cartoonists. Cartoonists…
Obscenity Case Files: Memoirs v. Massachusetts
In 1966, eleven years after the decision in Roth v. United States held that obscenity was not protected by the First Amendment and attempted to define obscene speech, came the landmark case of Memoirs v. Massachusetts. This case is about…
CBLDF Joins Amicus Brief Opposing Content-Based Taxation in New York
CBLDF and other members of the Media Coalition have joined forces to file an amicus brief to the Supreme Court, asking them to review a lower court’s decision in New Loudon Corp. v. State of N.Y. Tax Appeals Tribunal. The…
Japanese Editor Arrested for Distributing Obscene Images
Three people, including Akira Ōta, who heads the editorial department at Core Magazine, have been arrested in Japan amid accusations of obscenity. Those arrested are being accused of selling magazines and manga that had sexual content which was insufficiently censored, a…