Shotacon

yeah it makes no sense to me either. mangago recently removed a shotacon doujinshi because enough people complained, so i don’t get why the tag even exists anymore. i feel like the same ppl excusing it would lose their shit if it was a little girl instead.

PREACHHHHH GIRL PREACHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH SKSKSKSK SAY IT LOUDER FOR THE HOES IN THE BACK

Of course pedophilia is sick no matter what gender it is regarding. However, lolicon & shotacon isn't about sexualizing children, it's not supposed to be anyway. It's just small cutesy types, they could be 30 years old but chibi-like. But yes there are people who will do that sick sh*t and identify it as lolicon &/or shotacon, so you will end up finding that kind of thing in manga tagged with it, sadly.

I'm going to use a quora answer I found for if lolicon is bad (it applies to shota):There is nothing inherently wrong with lolicon. Allow me to explain. Firstly, lolis are not real. They can be drawings, paintings, and animated characters, but they are not real, living, breathing children. Lolicon material is not child pornography because no child is being harmed - or is in anyway present - in the making of it. In fact, not all lolis are even children, some are hundreds of years old. But of coarse, regardless of how old or young any fictional character is supposed to be, their age doesn’t matter since they’re not real.

Now, let’s suppose you like lolis… even though there is nothing wrong with it, people will look down upon you for it. This is because too many people are uneducated on the subject. If you don’t know what a lolicon is and have to use Wikipedia to gain information, then you really don’t have any right to speak for or against it.

Secondly, some may ask “isn’t that for pedophiles?” Here’s my answer. No. While it is true some lolicon may be pedophiles, most are not. Case in point, myself. Ask any lolicon, and they’ll admit they like lolis but they’ll also tell you they have no interest in real children (this could be because of the belief that “2D is superior to 3D” within the anime and manga fanbase). As for those few lolicon who are pedophiles, lolicon material can act as a substitute for child pornography. Don’t you think it’s better for them to have this rather than real child pornography where there are real victims of sexual abuse? You may think, “if they enjoy lolicon material, it’s only a matter of time before they start acting it out in real life,” but that is incorrect. Think about the plethora of violent movies, do you honestly think that when someone watches one they’re immediately going to mimic it in real life? No, of course you don’t, that would be ridiculous! Humans are not sheep that do as they see.

The morality and ethics that go into this is one thing, but law is a whole other beast. In most places, I’m sure lolicon material is illegal or at least in a grey area. I am uncertain of where it is legal, and how much of a grey area it is in law.

I mean you look it up & it basically says it is about sexualizing children, but what I'm saying is that not the entirety of manga in that genre is about that, many just include small cutesy characters.

Woah, that's a new info. All the shotacon/lolicon I've encountered were legit kids. But I did encounter "cute" adults to the point that they look illegal HAHAHA, they weren't tagged as Shota tho .

Besides, some pedophile stories get past me sometimes because they make the kid look like an adult

The only shotacon & lolicon that I've read included small adorable adults. I think I've only come across one where it was actually a kid age-wise, blegh, stopped reading that one real quick. I've been reading manga for over 8-ish something years though and I only came across that one with a very underage character. The genre itself isn't about sexualizing kids, people just like overly adorable types. Like the other person said, the character could be around 100 years old. That actually reminds me of the anime Vampire Bund.

Oh yeah, I've read a few where the younger one was like 16/17 while the older one was in their early twenties. Of course it'd be weird in real life but because they're drawn in a way where they look like they're in the same age range I just imagine the older one being younger or I just ignore it.

never did this MF just type a whole college level essay defending loli's lmfao, no one should have this much free time

I just unrolled this (didn't think it was this long, but it was informational. I feel bad for ignoring it sorry!). I can agree with the safety of preferring lolicon content instead of child pornography. However, humans can be more "sheep-like" than we try to deny. If lolicons are sexualized to the point of blurring reality from fantasy, those with pedophillic tendencies would end up using actual children to role play fiction. Emphasizing "PEDOPHILLIC TENDENCIES".

But yeah... I guess this is where we draw the line between reality and fiction. And personally, I can finally filter what lolicons might or could be and those stories that are undeniably of pedophillic content (both educational or fetishized). Since there are pedophillic contents that are actually more documentary-like or realistic instead of fetishization.