Feb. 17
5:37 PM
Sympathy for a Pervert
I'm a week behind on this, which really isn't that bad for me, but I recently learned that Christopher Handley was sentenced to six months in prison last week for possession of dirty comic books. I'm not talking a risque issue of Archie, either, I'm talking dirty, dirty hentai, comics depicting a wide array of criminal acts and sexual violence. But, and the but is all that really matters here, his arrest and sentencing all came about because of comic books. Holy shit, has my country gone insane? Again?
The content in Handley's imported comic books was extreme, no doubt, but why should anyone, especially the criminal justice system, care what kind of illustrations people draw or look at? And make no mistake, the courts put Handley over a barrel here, as I understand it--fight the charges and risk fifteen years in prison or plead guilty and we'll go easy on you. So Handley pled guilty to possessing “obscene visual representations of the sexual abuse of children” and will go down for six months. In other words, his life is completely ruined--and the last thing you want to be labeled in prison is Short Eyes, and I sincerely doubt his future cellmates will see the fundamental difference between child pornography and comic books when the courts couldn't.
The absurdity of Handley's case and the tragic outcome of his trusting in the court system with a plea bargain is of interest to me because I produce material that, depending on who you talk to, could be considered either artistic or exploitative. Granted, I work with words instead of pictures, but in The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart I describe a rather wide array of heinous crimes in graphic detail. Possessing my book is perfectly legal because depicting certain crimes (read: most of them) is intrinsically different from depicting certain other crimes. Apparently. This case is of interest to me because I don't think producing or collecting art is a crime when no actual crimes were committed in the creation or acquisition of said art. Goddamn comic books.
Do I personally think collecting illustrations of naked children and bestiality is creepy? It doesn't matter, because no children or animals are harmed, exploited, or endangered when someone draws a picture. Worse still, the time and money that went into prosecuting this poor bastard could have, you know, actually gone to stopping child pornographers and kiddie porn collectors. Do you personally find the content of such comics creepy/distasteful/reprehensible? Doesn't matter, because it is a goddamn comic book. Or, at least, it shouldn't matter--it certainly does now. There's plenty of grey areas when it comes to the law, and the lines between art and pornography can certainly be blurry, but few things can be more black and white than the difference between molesting and exploiting a real child and drawing something on a piece of paper.
Black and white. Goddamn comic books.
My country scares the shit out of me sometimes.