The issue is not that Japan is hosting child pornography sites or that is the main market for it. The problem is it being one of the main producers of child pornographic images that are distributed worldwide. I read (but haven't substantiated) that Interpol believes 80% of the worldwide child pornographic images originate out of Japan.

The issue is one that receives not only international criticism but plenty of internal criticism as well. The Japanese aren't totally unaware of the issues but getting legislative changes to the laws regarding child pornography has been very slow and Japan is seen as falling behind on this issue and is hindering worldwide efforts to stop the proliferation of child pornography.

Japan main culprit in online child pornography

The biggest issue is that because it's not illegal to possess child pornography here Japan has become a place to hold and store such materials. To think that those in possession of it are not going to distribute it for profit is naive at best.

It seems almost impossible to prevent these porn sites on the web.

So much of the SPAM that bombards our emails is Pornographic.

A daughter of a very good friend divorced her husband when she discovered he was downloading child pornography.

He spent several years in prison.

Its too easy to find on the NET.

i'm not much of a porn guy.yet they are images that bother me.i love manga drawing and art magazines.they're fun with gifts and posters and stuff...but mags like "megime"? have drawings of girls that are way too young.I've stopped buying them.

It is interesting, but also a little misleading. Yes porn shops in Japan are full of videos and pictures of naked girls under the age of 20.

That's because the legal age of posing naked is 18 in Japan. The same is true in America. Now take that sentence and change "20" to "18" and I don't think it is true anymore.

It seems like the biggest issue is "virtual child pornography" which is manga and anime depicting children in sexual situations. Japan certainly produces a lot of this, but keep in mind no children are actually involved.

Reminds me that was a bit of a thing about this on Livejournal a while back- they set up a filter and started shutting down anything that depicted or discussed underage people involved in sexual activity, because someone had complained about communities promoting anime, manga and fiction depicting children in sexual situations. However it was a major glitch because it wasn't fine enough with it's criteria- it shut down help groups for people who had been abused as children and it shut down an academic group for discussion on Romeo and Juliet. It also struggled when it encountered fandoms where the principle characters ~appeared~ under 18 with the art style but were canonically older, or communities which specifically 'aged up' characters (like Harry Potter). A number of journals also appealed on the grounds that LJ was saying their content was 'illegal' (eg, 16yo characters) but they were based outside the USA and it was perfectly legal in their country.

/end off topic.

No. I was meaning I've a history of interest in junior gravure idols and I know what's sexy and what's not.

I have no idea what you're talking about. You're completely delusional, Ronin. In this case, I side with the Japanese, and I have no problem with girls in bikinis.

No you "side" with the people that look at under-developed and underage girls. It's not the same thing.

If I remember correctly, underdeveloped was not Tenchu's angle. But that was years ago.

It's pretty much 18 anywhere in the world isn't?

It's not just the virtual stuff. The issue is it is not illegal to possess child pornography of any kind here in Japan. Because of this it is becoming a major resource for child pornography as it is one of the very few countries in the world where you can possess such stuff and not be thrown in jail. I'd hope that there'd not be anyone on here who would try and defend peoples right to possess child pornography? This is part of the law here that truly needs changing and quickly.

Most definitely no defense of actual child pornography from me.

The law needs to be passed, and those making the law need to wake up to reality and stop trying to sneak in little back doors by which they can censor practically anything.
This is the reason that the laws don`t pass. Everyone wants to stop child pornographers, but they don`t want the law to be used to usher in other forms of censorship... And that is all that has been happening so far. They keep trying to piggy back things on to it that would let them censor a LOT - or leave them with something so broad that it would be nearly impossible to attempt to properly enforce.

They should just make it simple and clear.