Texas’s state senate unanimously passed Senate Bill 20 which aims at AI-generated child pornography but can also end up banning many anime and manga titles in the process. Texas has joined many other states, such as Ohio and West Virginia, in efforts to crack down on materials deemed obscene. Ohio and West Virginia have bills which establish criminal liability for teachers and librarians if they distribute materials deemed obscene (School Library Journal, 2024). Yes, this can include anime and manga. Sasaki and Miyano Volume 1, a BL manga, was banned by Florida’s Brevard Country Public School Board after a mother who hadn’t read the manga (a common pattern with book bans) put in an official complaint, calling it “pornography and suggesting it could lead to ‘compulsive masturbation'” (Davidson, 2024).
Before I go further, I have to add a disclaimer (you know how this legal stuff works). I’m not a lawyer or law advisor, so my discussion on these bills and legal definitions are just opinions and not legal advice. A few semesters of copyright law and other regulations as a librarian doesn’t scratch the surface of the legal tangles censorship involves.
If you’ve looked into Texas’s bill, no doubt you’ve seen a lot of pitchforks and sky-is-falling comments from the fan community. Let’s take a look at the sections of Senate Bill No. 20 (S.B. No. 20) and the sections of the Texas penal code it references. The bill adds language and adjusts already existing regulations.
A person commits an offense if the person knowingly possesses, accesses with intent to view, or promotes obscene visual material containing a depiction that appears to be of a child younger than 18 years of age engaging in activities described by Section 43.21(a)(1)(B), regardless of whether the depiction is an image of an actual child, a cartoon or animation, or an image created using an artificial intelligence application or other computer software.
I added emphasis to the parts which concern us. And here’s Section 43.21(a)(1)(B):
“Obscene” means material or a performance that:
(A) the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find that taken as a whole appeals to the prurient interest in sex;
(B) depicts or describes:
(i) patently offensive representations or descriptions of ultimate sexual acts, normal or perverted, actual or simulated, including sexual intercourse, sodomy, and sexual bestiality; or
(ii) patently offensive representations or descriptions of masturbation, excretory functions, sadism, masochism, lewd exhibition of the genitals, the male or female genitals in a state of sexual stimulation or arousal, covered male genitals in a discernibly turgid state or a device designed and marketed as useful primarily for stimulation of the human genital organs; and
(C) taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, and scientific value.
Let’s unpack this. S.B. No. 20’s language, as I emphasized, would net most anime and manga because of how they focus on high school characters. The language expressly includes “a cartoon or animation,” if you have any doubts about the words “depiction” and “appears to be of a child younger than 18 years of age.” Next, we have to look at the activities listed in Section 43.21(A)(1)(B). Most US state laws I’ve read have similar language with their definitions of obscenity. The definition runs close to “you know it when you see it” with how it leans on the idea of an average person and contemporary community standards. This ideas can change and beg the questions:
- Who is an average person?
- What are contemporary community standards? Which community?
- Who decides literary, artistic, political, and scientific value?
The definition attempts to address these questions by listing specific examples and a carve-out (item C) for works which may hit those examples but may still be of value. The carve-out allows for scientific reports about human sexuality, for example, which would otherwise fall under this obscenity definition. As you can see from the examples and the language of the bill, a good portion of hentai and ecchi genres would be deemed obscene. Many involve high schools or lolita characters, which would fall under the appearance of a child younger than 18. However, having young characters wouldn’t be enough to flag an anime or manga. They also have to engage in sex acts which could include breast or nipple rubbing, depending on the interpretation of “masturbation” the court wants to enforce. So, depending on courts’ interpretation of A and B of the obscenity definition, High School DxD among most other ecchi which toe the hentai-line could be banned. Anime like Kill la Kill might also be caught into the net, but the carve-out might be argued in Kill la Kill‘s favor because of the satirical and social commentary it provides. “Junk food” ecchi, seinen, and josei titles which don’t offer much beyond titillation would struggle to be added to the carve-out. Gushing Over Magical Girls would be banned with how many items it hits: sadism, masochism, lewd exhibition, arousal, and perverted sex acts. Perverted is a vague term which, along with “simulated” could catch a variety of anime and manga titles.
S.B. No. 20’s language could include anime fans, streaming platforms, and librarians by possessing, intentionally viewing, and promoting anime and manga which would run afoul of the obscenity definition. Could this mean a fan could get in trouble with the law if they buy or view banned titles? Possibly. 18 U.S. Code § 2258A requires communication service providers to report to authorities when they notice CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Material) access (Cornell Law School, n.d.). And just a caution, VPNs don’t protect against this. ISPs can still see all the packets which go into and out of a VPN gateway. VPNs protect against outside tracking and helps hide your information from the exit point. But the data between you and the VPN entry point can be read as it travels through your ISP’s systems. So in short, yes. If you live in Texas and this gets passed, you could get into trouble by watching Gushing Over Magical Girls or some other ecchi anime. Librarians might also get into legal trouble if they offer access or even suggest, “promote,” a manga or novel which has underage characters in sexual situations.
Crunchyroll, HiDive, and other anime-related companies have headquarters and offices in Texas (Davidson, 2025), so this bill may influence what they offer if passed into law.
Texas’s bill and other related state regulations often target LGBTQ+ materials, in particular, for bans. The Florida situation with Sasaki and Miyano happened because it’s a Boys’ Love story. These laws and bills also catch Young Adult novels, which are often sexually graphic and involve minors. Most book challenges come from concerned parents and people who haven’t read or watched the content. Granted, if they did watch some anime or read some manga, they would become even more in favor of banning them!
You might be worried after reading this or wondering what you can do. Pitchforks and threats won’t do anything. Don’t send death threats or similar nonsense to representatives or people who want titles banned because of their ignorance about those titles. Instead, write your representatives and calmly tell them why you are against banning such content. Give them examples of titles which have helped you or even changed your life in addition and provide reasons like enforcement costs and freedom of speech concerns. If enough people write to them, representatives may reconsider their perspectives and even add other carve-outs. Most everyone wants to stop CSAM, and, let’s admit it, anime and manga often falls into the US CSAM definitions with how they sexualize minors. Some of that has to do with cultural differences and age-of-consent differences between Japan and the US. But most of it comes down to profitability. The West doesn’t get the adult-focused manga Japan has. Ecchi and hentai wouldn’t run afoul of these laws if they focused on adults–again, many do–and get away from the high school characters. Of course, teens are sexual beings too, and stories which allow them to navigate that sexuality and the dynamics of relationships matter. This makes CSAM and bills like No. 20 thorny because they aim rightly at safeguarding minors from predators, but, at the same time, prevent telling detailed and helpful coming-of-age stories which can offer realistic situations. “Depiction” can include text, after all.
The teen years are a difficult area with how they subdivide into different developmental stages. A 13-year-old is far different from a 17-year-old. The fact that the human brain doesn’t fully mature until around 25 years old, on average, also complicates things. If anything, the age of adulthood ought to be lifted to 25, given the research and the logic behind using 18 as the age of adulthood. Perhaps the legal system should provide more of a gradient for bills like S.B. No. 20, which would allow for older teens to access detailed stories pertaining to their developmental concerns without that content being flagged as obscene. Of course, this still opens the window for pedophiles to access such content, which is what bills like this concern themselves with.
S.B. No. 20’s language looks like it will catch many anime and manga stories with its net. It’s too soon to say how often this will happen if the bill and others like it become law. The US seems to be on course for more regulations like this and for regulations which establish criminal liability against teachers and librarians. Authors may also censor themselves. This course will likely drive more people away from those fields and, perhaps, make some Japanese anime and manga companies hesitant to release some of their edgier stories to the States.
References
Cornell Law School. (n.d.) 18 U.S. Code § 2258A – Reporting requirements of providers https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2258A
Davidson, Danica (2024) INTERVIEW: How the Sasaki and Miyano Ban Happened. OTAKU USA Magazine.
Davidson, Danica (2025) Fans Worry Texas’ Senate Bill 20 Could Lead to Anime and Manga Bans — and Jail Time. OTAKU USA Magazine.
School Library Journal (2024) Ohio Advances Law to Criminalize Librarians for Materials Deemed “Obscene” | Censorship News.https://www.slj.com/story/Ohio-Advances-Law-Criminalize-Librarians-Materials-Deemed-Obscene-Censorship-News.
Texas Penal Code. https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/PE/htm/PE.43.htm
Texas Senate Bill. S.B. No. 20 https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/89R/billtext/html/SB00020E.htm
Reading through this, it seems as though the law’s drafters were trying to be specific enough not to fall into the category of, “I’ll know it when I see it.” Nevertheless, I can imagine the legal quagmire in a case of trying to prosecute any form of mainstream entertainment consumption. I suspect the intent is probably to merge the legal status of more realistic A.I.-generated imagery into already existing laws. But then the gray area becomes the definition of “realistic”.
Actual enforcement is another issue. Consider the difficulty in prosecuting physical cross-border drug transactions merely facilitated over the Internet, even in cases where laws were similar in all jurisdictions. Somehow, I don’t see Interpol, or even the FBI assisting in tracking down some lewd-anime kingpin. So the best this might actually accomplish is perhaps getting some local judge to issue a search-warrant to seize a computer or a DVD collection.
Clearly, this is aimed fundamentally at instilling fear in librarians or book-store operators where graphic novels of any type might be considered to fall into the definition of being “realistic” enough to stimulate the reader. And that puts this into the domain of a political stunt, no different than banning pronouns or prosecuting “micro-aggressions”. The pendulum will swing.
The bigger danger in accepting such invasive regulation is that it can excuse handing content enforcement over to technologies. More concerning to me is something like a Windows, Google or IOS A.I. media scanner flagging some content attached to an email, or merely censoring something it deems inappropriate for viewing… or perhaps reading. And we’re already there in that regard.
Words like “perverted” and “realistic” and “average” are soft-meaning words even with the examples of obscenity in the legal definition. Some people find anime and other drawings more attractive than “realistic” depictions. Average is a floating standard. Enforcement may come down to internet service providers and other communication systems monitoring, but as you mention, handing this enforcement to technology runs causes problems too. False positives will happen, especially depending on how the carve-outs for merit are decided. When I was a librarian, I had already seen problems with the “merit” discussion, especially when it came to culturally different perspectives like anime and manga. Historical accounts especially run into this problem because some don’t see much merit in history to begin with, sadly.
Many don’t realize how much of their search and Internet access is already curated and censored. Even within the public library system, the nature of funding and the need to cater to popular items leads to censorship of many voices. I often go hunting for research, books, and other articles. The public library system’s focus on entertainment means, more often than not, I can’t find them, such as compilations of Thomas Merton’s essays. And Merton was/is pretty mainstream! “Average” can censor indirectly by crowding out higher-quality material purchases.
Good observation regarding the weasel words. And indeed, the Internet is already both actively and passively censored in ways that make it difficult to find legitimate information, even news. So while it seems inevitable that “enforcement” will come down to monitoring by ISPs and automated technologies, it’ll likely be pretty error-prone. Recently researching the history of “mabiki” (間引き) in Japan (on a filtered and monitored academic system, no less), one can only imagine the 6:00 “news” reports. My libertarian streak cringes at the thought.
Thomas Merton… Not someone I’ve read; regardless,that sent me down a rabbit hole. It seems the Merton Legacy Trust has a bizarrely tight grip on his writings! I’m wondering what that’s all about?
I hope you were able to worm around all those filters for your search! That topic most certainly has been scrubbed! For readers who don’t know the word: “Mabiki” means infanticide and also refers to the book, “Mabiki: Infanticide and Population Growth in Eastern Japan, 1660-1950 ” by Fabian Drixler. Personalized Internet feeds contribute to all the siloing we see nowadays. My Internet is different from your Internet. I miss the days when the Internet was harder to use but was more open and the same for everyone.
Merton’s writings are sometimes critical of the Catholic Church and touch on Taoism and other Asian philosophies, particularly where they overlap with Christianity, which might make the Church a bit squirmy.