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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   252 thread views

Transnational Thursday for February 12, 2026

Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

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The Guardian: An Australian woman has been found guilty of producing, possessing, and distributing illegal child pornography for writing and distributing (for pre-publication review, not yet actually selling) a 210-page book in which an 18-year-old woman engages in sexual "ageplay" (pretending to be a toddler) with an older man. It does not appear that a transcript of this local court proceeding is available in Australia's judicial database. But the article indicates that, in the judge's view, the author's descriptions of this "18-year-old woman" were just a sham intended to evoke the visual image of a child. (See also the "9000-year-old loli" meme.) Reddit comments indicate that, in addition to what is described in this article, the book also includes a passage in which the man fantasizes about the future woman while she is only three years old.

Australian AO3 users in shambles (1 2)?

Given how deep the non-US Anglosphere is into thoughtcrime suppression and digital fascism, it's kinda hard to care especially strongly about this particular one. I mean, you could be arrested and fined or jailed for displaying national flag or asking people to speak English, not to mention about publicly stating something really politically controversial and offensive to wokeness. Am I really surprised somebody walking the edge between barely acceptable and woodchipper-worthy and dipping the toes in the waters of madness is persecuted? If it were the US, we could talk about artistic value, "People vs. Flint" and all those nice things. If we're talking about countries where freedom of speech doesn't exist, yeah, it's a bad place to be an edgelord (or should I say edgelady?) there, because it's a bad place for any non-approved speech there, so duh...

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