Skelaturi wrote:Jack_Smythe wrote:
Like others have said, it is a game and therefore is fantasy. There is no law, in the US anyway, that I believe it is illegal to portray minors having sex in a fantasy setting. The laws pertain to real people.
Ehh for the US i believe there is, for Europe its debatable. Look at the Protect Act of 2003 as long as its not obscene
Thanks, Skelaturi! Wasn't aware of this law.
From what I can gather from searching, it needs to meet the 4 criteria for the Miller Obscenity test which was aimed at preventing "hardcore child pornography." There are ongoing debates about the criteria since nudity isn't covered by the Miller test due to nudity not being a hardcore act in itself. However, there is this:
"The PROTECT Act, which was signed into law in April 2003, amended child- pornography laws in several ways. First, it created a new definition of child pornography to include pornographic pictures of children that are “virtually indistinguishable” from actual children. It also requires defendants to prove that the images they possess or distribute were not made with and do not depict actual children."
Second, works of serious caliber trump the Miller test since the fourth requisite of the Miller test is: "Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value." They put this clause in so books, scientific studies, and other child sex related issues could still be addressed and they are operating under the assumption that pornography is inherently not serious enough in nature to qualify. A good literary example is in Stephen King's It where he portrayed a hardcore sex act among the 12 year old child protagonists of the novel. They took turns sleeping with the only girl in the group to solidify their bond and power to fight Pennywise. Since it is a serious work of literary fiction, I'm under the understanding that it does not conform to the Miller test which is why I can still buy the book. Then again, I'm not even close to being a lawyer!
There are "virtual" sections of the law and they state the same thing saying that the character portrayed should not be based on or LOOK like a real child.
By the way, I agree with everything the Protect Act is trying to accomplish and it's why this is such a great topic for discussion. I personally think that there are plenty of settings and topics that authors can create or use that involve 18+ year old characters. I say just avoid underage sex altogether in your works and keep it 18+ or as someone suggested, never disclose the age of the character and make sure they look old enough to be 18 even though they may be younger in your head.