I think it really depends on what kind of anime you’re talking about. Like if you’re watching one piece fan art and the British police raided you, absolutely ridiculous. If you’re looking at naked artistic depictions of minors then it’s clearly not just “anime artwork”. BTW I’m not saying that someone who looks at that should be treated the same way as someone who harms a child but I’m just saying the cultural acceptance in the uk between those two extremes is vast.
> I think it really depends on what kind of anime you’re talking about
Does it? If I draw a naked stick figure with boobs and say it is 14, is that morally wrong? At what point should a person care? Their point is that a drawing doesn't hurt people right?
How do you determine that though? Do you put the pictures in front of a jury? I am riding the metro daily in a big Asian city and I am pretty sure many of the "anime" ads will be unacceptable on the other side of the world.
They just said "illegal" artwork, they didn't stipulate. (So this could be incest, bestiality, loli, etc, etc.)
Why would cultural acceptance matter? Classifying drawing something - regardless of what it is - as a "crime" is ridiculous.
Like, for example, I don't like rape (or strangulation, something else they'll start arresting people for now since they recently made it a crime), but I don't want to see people jailed for drawing it, or jailed for looking at anime/drawings/manga/visual novels of/containing it.
I'd rather see people who actually abuse, exploit or cause general suffering to another human being arrested and jailed.