Redditor discovered ordering lolicon manga in Canada was a bad idea

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I was browsing r/legaladvicecanada yesterday and I found a post made by a redditor saying that they ordered some hentai manga from Japan in Canada. Unfortunately, for them, some of the manga was seized by customs, supposedly for containing “obscene material”. The post was made a few months ago, but I still thought it was worth reading:

https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvicecanada/comments/13m8m8m/my_mangas_were_detained_by_customs_on_suspicion/

Hello advisors! I am currently a permanent resident in Canada. A few months ago I ordered some hentai mangas from Japan. Three of them were later detained by the CBSA on suspicion of containing child pornography and sexual assault content. Specifically they stated that the manga books were prohibited from being imported under tariff section 9899.0000 of the customs tariff and classified under D9-1-1, sexual assault.

The government sent me a letter to notify me of the action and give me 3 options as below. (2 months ago I received a similar letter but I ignored it and this is the 2nd letter I received with the same content.)

As the importer of this material, you may exercise one of the following options:

  • (1) you may dispute this decision, pursuant to section 60 of the Customs Act, by filing a written request to the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) within 90 days of the date of determination indicated on Part B of this form, referring to the title of the material in question and the reference number (shown as Regional Control No. on the top right-hand corner on the front of this form). In the case of obscenity, you may also wish to include in your appeal arguments with regard to the artistic, literary, or other merit of the material in question. Please note that the submission of any additional information is voluntary on your part. The letter of appeal should be forwarded to the following address: (1.0)

Prohibited Importations Unit Canada Border Services Agency c/o CBSA Mail Processing Unit 2215 Gladwin Crescent, Entrance C Ottawa ON, K1A OL8

  • (2) you may export the goods at your expense, pursuant to subsection 102(1) of the Customs Act, under CBSA control. Since Canada Post prohibits the use of the mail system for the transportation of prohibited goods, please contact the CBSA office at the point of entry (shown on the top right-hand corner on the front of this form) to make export arrangements; or
  • (3) you may abandon the material to the Crown, forfeiting your right to appeal or export, in which case the material will be destroyed 90 days after the date of determination.

The If no contact with the CBSA is made within 90 days of the date of determination, the material will be considered forfeit, pursuant to subsection 39(1) of the Customs Act, and will be destroyed.

Pursuant to subsection 39(2) of the Customs Act, the importer of goods that are forfeit under subsection (1) and the owner thereof at the time of forfeiture are jointly and severally liable for all reasonable expenses incurred by Her Majesty in right of Canada in the disposal of the goods, where they are disposed of otherwise than by sale.

Please note that the costs incurred by Her Majesty in holding the goods in safekeeping, pursuant to subsection 37(1), are also the responsibility of the owner and importer under subsection 38(1).

My question is am I likely to get arrested for this problem? And what should I follow to stay out of trouble? Thanks in advance!

Anyway, among the responses, people seemed to agree that the redditor should choose option 3. That being said, like 99% of the subreddit, the other bit of advice was “get a lawyer lol”.

One of the responses was:

Dude……wtf are you in to? Take option 3 and move on. Maybe look within and figure out what’s going go with you. Maybe the stuff you ordered is not okay?

And then, the redditor responded with:

calm bro. I have researched and found a lot of similar cases, Canadian Customs said that manga=CPorn, it can be understood that the Japanese manga/anime drawings make the character look very childlike compared to the age mentioned by the author. (e.g. a 30 year old character like Tatsumaki from OPM has the appearance of an elementary school student) that’s due to the distinctive drawing style you’ll find in any Japanese manga. I’m completely normal, and I didn’t know before that a fictional character with the appearance of a child could be considered child pornography.

The redditor got downvoted for that. Apparently, defending lolicon is a big no-no on the subreddit. In some other comments, people equate lolicon with actual CSAM. Isn’t that just great?

There was actually another Reddit post (on the same subreddit) that I was gonna mention about a redditor importing hentai manga in Canada, but having it destroyed later by customs and then getting threatened with being charged with “child pornography”. The post was made and then got deleted yesterday, so that’s why I didn’t mention it. It might have been from the same person (that’s what some of the comments were saying before the post got deleted).

Any thoughts?

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The one and only thought I have is that a Japsnese comic does NOT compare to real deal CSAM. Unless the “offending material” was based on a real kid’s likeness, it’s cut and dry that it shouldn’t be lumped into the same category as an actual flesh-and-blood child being sexually exploited/abused.

I know it’s just repeating ourselves, but it bears repeating: FICTION ≠ ABUSE. And to those saying “but fiction ENCOURAGES irl abuse!”, the jury’s still out on that one, leaning “it doesn’t”. You gonna tell me that violent movies and games also inspire real life crime? Should we up and outright ban stuff like “Saw” and “Grand Theft Auto”? “Oh, but that’s different cuz you ain’t whackin’/schlickin’ it while poppin’ heads in GTA!” Yeah? And “Taxi Driver” almost got Ronald Reagan killed, doesn’t mean we should ban it. What a person does after consuming something is on them, NOT the work.

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All I have to say is thay Reddit is shit. It’s an asscrack filled with pilonidal cysts and infection. It used to be good back in the day, when they actually allowed free speech. But now that it’s commercialized and mainstream, you have all these normies spouting their bandwagon bullshit. Don’t use Reddit for stuff like this.

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The guy who ordered this “manga” or whatever is an idiot, and I’m not saying that lightly. You’re getting incensed that comparisons are being made between CSAM and lolicon – under Canadian law, there is effectively no difference.

You can go to prison for text or cartoons, just the same as you would for images that show the abuse of a real child. This is nothing less than insane but it is what it is, and the law is NOT going to change anytime soon.

Go to the comic book legal defense fund page, and read about the case of R v Matheson – he was originally going to be charged with child pornography over thumbnail manga images. Thankfully, those charges were dropped, and he only had to plead guilty to a Customs Act offence. Still, it took more than two years, and cost north of $75K US for his legal expenses.

https://cbldf.org/about-us/case-files/cbldf-case-files/cbldf-case-files-canada-customs-case/

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The one and only thought I have is that a Japsnese comic does NOT compare to real deal CSAM. Unless the “offending material” was based on a real kid’s likeness, it’s cut and dry that it shouldn’t be lumped into the same category as an actual flesh-and-blood child being sexually exploited/abused.

I know it’s just repeating ourselves, but it bears repeating: FICTION ≠ ABUSE. And to those saying “but fiction ENCOURAGES irl abuse!”, the jury’s still out on that one, leaning “it doesn’t”. You gonna tell me that violent movies and games also inspire real life crime? Should we up and outright ban stuff like “Saw” and “Grand Theft Auto”? “Oh, but that’s different cuz you ain’t whackin’/schlickin’ it while poppin’ heads in GTA!” Yeah? And “Taxi Driver” almost got Ronald Reagan killed, doesn’t mean we should ban it. What a person does after consuming something is on them, NOT the work.

FWIW, I agree with you. That said, you can make repeat these arguments until the sun burns out, and they will not make any difference to the Parliamentarians that passed these laws. Someone once challenged Parliamentarians on this, i.e. that there is no factual basis for these laws, and the reply they got back was that Parliament can pass any laws that they like – they don’t have to be backed by science or evidence.

Canada Customs is literally notorious for their prudish attitudes!

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