Legal status of cartoon pornography depicting minors

The legal status of drawn pornography depicting minors varies from country to country and concerns simulated pornography and child pornography.

Some analysts have argued whether cartoon pornography depicting minors is a "victimless crime". Laws have been enacted to criminalize "obscene images of children, no matter how they are made", for inciting abuse. An argument is the claim that obscene fictional images portray children as sex objects, thereby contributing to child sexual abuse. This argument has been disputed by the fact that there is no scientific basis for that connection as of 1999, and that restricting sexual expression in drawings or animated games and videos might actually increase the rate of sexual crime by eliminating an outlet for desires that could motivate crime.

Currently, countries that have made it illegal to possess (as well as create and distribute) sexual images of fictional characters who are described as or appear to be under eighteen years old include Australia, Canada, the Philippines, South Africa, South Korea and the United Kingdom. At the upper edge, this encapsulates pornographic depictions of even seventeen-year-olds together, or adults where the predominant impression conveyed is of a person under the age of 18 (such as small-breasted women).

All sexualised depictions of children under the age of 18 (or who appear to be under that age) are illegal in Australia, and there is a "zero-tolerance" policy in place.

In December 2008, a man from Sydney was convicted of possessing child pornography after sexually explicit pictures of children characters from The Simpsons were found on his computer. The NSW Supreme Court upheld a Local Court decision that the animated Simpsons characters "depicted", and thus "could be considered", real people. Controversy arose over the perceived ban on small-breasted women in pornography after a South Australian court established that if a consenting adult in pornography were "reasonably" deemed to look under the age of consent, then they could be considered depictions of child pornography. Criteria described stated "small breasts" as one of few examples, leading to the outrage. Again, the classification law is not federal or nationwide and only applies to South Australia.

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