Asia Pacific Censorship News

North Korea is stepping up punishments and intensifying a crackdown based on the anti-reactionary thought law adopted at the end of last year. The law seems to have strengthened the authorities' repression and control over citizens in the country.

According to a source in North Pyongan Province, a teenage boy who was caught watching pornography at his home in Sinuiju earlier this month has been exiled to the countryside along with his parents.

The teenager was watching a pornographic video late at night when his parents were not at home. He was caught during a surprise inspection by a task force created to monitor deviant behavior.

Article 29 of the new law calls for sentences of five to 15 years of correctional labor for consumption or possession of pornographic videos or books, photos or drawings that preach superstition. Individuals who produce, import or distribute such materials may get life sentences of correctional labor or even the death penalty, depending on the quantity of the material.

However, it appears that because the anti-reactionary thought law does not prescribe punishment regulations for adolescents, the punishment was set to deportation instead of correctional labor. Articles 34-38 of the law stipulate fines of KPW 100,000 to 200,000 if a reactionary thought crime occurs due to the irresponsible education of children and orders the entire family to move to the countryside as punishment for the parents.

Assassin's Creed Valhalla is the latest release in Ubisoft's longest-running franchise. It seems that not all versions of the game are equal to others. Japanese players say the game isn't what was promised, and further that it was censored egregiously compared to western versions of the game.

The Japanese release of Assassin's Creed Valhalla is censored in several significant ways. It removes or alters violent gameplay and animations related to severed limbs, torture involving inner organs, decapitated heads and female nudity, including nipples.

The game features a worldwide option to turn blood spurts during combat on and off. However, presumably because the game is already censored in Japan, the option then does very little.

Japanese buyers have also complained that the availability of the option implies that more violence is available than actually is, and so feel misled.

With the usual corporate bullshit, Ubisoft claimed that the removal of blood spurts was necessary for ratings purposes. But CERO, Japan's Computer Entertainment Rating Organization, said that that blood spurts comparable to previous Assassin's Creed releases in Japan were included when it did its rating.

Update: Patched

27th November 2020. See article from gamerant.com

Ubisoft is issuing a fix to Assassin's Creed Valhalla following the revelation that Japanese versions of the game had depictions of blood censored.

A Japanese Ubiblog post has now acknowledges the problematic censorship, stating that blood cannot be depicted in-game and that the development team is preparing a patch to solve the issue releasing sometime in December. Ubisoft goes on to apologize for the inconvenience to its customers.

A Cambodian proposal to ban girls wearing short skirts and men's shirtless has been tabled in parliament. MPs supporting this proposal have claimed that this will not only stop the increasing sexual violence in society but also strengthen Cambodian culture. If this resolution is passed in Parliament, the local police will get the right to take legal action against those wearing such clothes.

If the proposal gets approval from many Cambodian government ministries and the national parliament, it will be implemented from early 2021. After this, if a man appears shirtless in public places or a woman / girl in short skirt, then they will be fined.

365 Days (365 DNI) is a 2020 Poland drama by Barbara Bialowas.
Starring Michele Morrone, Anna Maria Sieklucka and Bronislaw Wroclawski.

Massimo Torricelli, a young and handsome boss of a Sicilian Mafia family, has no other option but to takeover after his father has been assassinated. Laura Biel is a sales director in a luxurious hotel. She has a successful career, but her private life lacks passion. She is taking one last shot to save her relationship. Together with her partner and friends, she takes a trip to Sicily. Laura does not expect that Massimo, the most dangerous man on the island, will get in her way, kidnap her, hold her captive and give her 365 days... to fall in love with him. "365 dni" is the first Polish erotic film. It is based on the best-selling novel of the same name from author Blanka Lipinksa.

A British singer named Duffy is asking Netflix CEO Reed Hastings to remove the sexy film 365 Days claiming that it glorifies rape and sex trafficking.

365 Days is an erotic thriller from Poland that has been likened to Fifty Shades of Grey . It is quite sexy for Netflix and has become the services's biggest movie of the summer. The film is is about a mobster who kidnaps a woman he's been stalking, holding her captive for an entire year so that she'll fall in love with him. Naturally, she eventually does fall for her hunky captor and has a lot of sex with him, in various positions filmed from many angles.

The films detractors have organised a petition against the film which has been signed by about 54,000 people.

Now Duffy has weighed in against the film citing her own experience with being drugged in a restaurant and being abducted. She found the premise of 365 Days was just a little too familiar to the singer, so she wrote an open letter calling Netflix irresponsible for airing the film.

Update: Noted by the New Zealand film censor

7th July 2020. See article from rnz.co.nz

 When it was first launched in New Zealand, 365 Days carried a rating of R16, but that was bumped up after Chief Censor David Shanks got involved. Shanks said:

We felt that age rating was inadequate, we thought that this was more at the 18-plus level. We also wrote to Netflix and advised that they should warn for sexual violence as well as potentially highly impactful content in this film that viewers should be warned about.

Shanks said it was frustrating that the legislation his office operated under was from 1993, and therefore did not cover streaming services. But there was a bill before parliament which if passed, would change that and allow for Netflix to rate films more in line with New Zealand standards.

 

Update: A petition to ban 365 Days

16th July 2020. See article from standard.co.uk

A petition to ban the Polish Netflix film has gained about 70,000 signatures.

The Change.org petition's author, fitness influencer Mikayla Zazon, wrote:

Netflix clearly stands on the side of the abusers by having a movie that glorifies, romanticizes, and condones sexual assault trending on their top 10 recommended movies to watch around the globe.

As a social media public figure and a victim of these crimes, I am outraged and heartbroken that this movie shows up on teens' 'watch next' recommendation.

By taking down this movie on Netflix, we can protect sexual violence in adolescent women and adult women. And we can prevent boys from seeing such horrific behaviour as permission to sexual assault and rape women.