Comics confound Canadian Customs

Blogger Elizabeth McClung writes about being detained by customs at the Canadian border (she’s Canadian) while the officers went through all her manga, looking for the dirty pictures.

As soon as I declared that I had some of the japanese inspired comic books called manga, a Custom’s officer said, “That’s the stuff from Japan; there is some really obscene and filthy stuff.”

Actually, it was printed in America and rated 13+, but that didn’t hold any water with the customs guys.

I was informed that I could have put different covers on or done anything else I could to get the pornography in and that if I spoke anymore, the books would be seized. So I stood there and watched my previously new books get examined page by page, thumbed through and pressed open because it was assumed if I read manga, that I was a sex offender.

McClung goes on to say that Canadian customs has a long history of targeting gay and lesbian materials, and even materials owned by gay and lesbian travelers. Comics and other books come in for special scrutiny. She sees two culprits: overbroad obscenity laws and a customs service with little oversight. It’s worth reading the whole thing to see how far astray Canada, which usually seems like a reasonable country, has gone, and the consequences it has:

DMP, who publishes the gay themed award winning series Antique Bakery won’t sell same-sex themed books or adult comics in Canada because their distributor Diamond, doesn’t want their other shipments of comics and manga seized (including when Canada Customs held a X-men comic shipment on the belief that X-men meant X-rated!).

Customs wrangles also hastened the closure of the only lesbian bookstore in Victoria, McClung writes. Despite the hassles, she is determined to continue bringing manga into Canada.

The issue is in their head, not mine, and if I won’t give in to the dozens of different groups and societal pressures to try to put me back in the closet then I sure am not going to give in to Canada Customs. Welcome to the Gulag!

(Found via the comments to this post at postmodernbarney.)

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