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Adult-Themed Comics At Library Shock Parents


Local 6 News reported that the comic titled "Peach Girl" is about a young girl drugged by her friends and then set up to be raped.

"As I was going through it, I said, 'Oh my God, do parents know what their kids are reading?'" mother Raynelle White said.

One of the comics found by Problem Solver Nancy Alvarez featured parents who swap spouses.

"That's swinging and this is a girl no older than my daughter," parent Travis White said.

"Sex, drugs and violence are the themes in this series published by TokyoPop," Alvarez said.

White believes no one looked past the cover of the comic and it is time that things changed at the library.

"I don't want to see it; I don't want her seeing it," Travis White said. "The whole time, I'm like, 'I can't believe we're seeing these things.'"

A spokeswoman for Orange County Libraries would not speak on camera but admitted there is not a screening process in place for books bound for the children's or young adult sections, Alvarez said.

The same comics are also available at the main branch in downtown Orlando.

A spokeswoman said it would be impossible to review all of the books the library receives at its locations. However, if it receives complaints, it will do its own review.

http://www.local6.com/news/5497816/detail.html From here

Cause they don't swap spouses on cable television.

Yeah, it probably shouldn't be put in the young adults section (depending on how graphic it is). But put it in the adult section, problem solved.

They're exagerating. Badly. >_> it's a young adult manga. Not childrens, but not adult either. Plus that doesn't even happen if I remember correctly. SO. strange people

Peach Girl isn't about a girl drugged and set up to be raped. Actually, I don't think it even happens like that in the book.

If people aren't going to actually put effort into figuring out what the book's about, then all sorts of books would be considered inappropriate for children.

Escushion wrote:Cause they don't swap spouses on cable television.

I'm sure the one they're talking about is Marmalade boy.

the thing that makes me mad is they aren't swingers who engage in a wife swap...they divorce and remarry and the two couples were old friends who met up agian later in life. The messed up parts of Marmalade boy aren't even discussed...like how the step kids become romantically envolved despite the fact that the boy thinks they may be blood related (that manga made me cry...I'm such a geek)

But more to the point these people are stupid.

they aren't even reading the material they're accusing

Man, out of all the manga they could've criticized... I can think of titles that are infinitely worse, some of which my library has on the shelves in the young adult section. For that matter, many libraries carry American comics that are even more inappropriate for impressionable young minds. *sigh*

Black Kitty wrote:Peach Girl isn't about a girl drugged and set up to be raped. Actually, I don't think it even happens like that in the book.

She does get drugged and put naked in a bed in a hotel room with a guy who was in on the whole thing and then blackmail pictures are taken of her. She's supposed to think she had sex with him, but it never happened.

It certainly wasn't the goal of the series like the article makes it seem to be, though .

Sorry, I'm just a big, big girly girl over Peach Girl.

I wish they wouldn't do stuff like this. I think 14+ is a perfectly acceptable age for kids to discern from reality and fiction. And if it just so happened that it was reality, then so be it. Just because they know of it doesn't mean that they'll go do it.

I really don't get the rationale of people like that. They want to censor it because they don't want their kids to see; its inappropriate. Okay, I get that its "inappropriate", but that doesn't stop it from happening though. I think the responsible thing to do is instead of sheltering a kid from stuff, if they experience it, then explain to the kid about it. Explain to it why the stuff exists and what maybe "inappropriate" about it, if that your wish. I just think that sheltering a kid from "inappropriate things" is a huge endeavor, and not worth that much of an effort in the long run since "inappropriate things" will always exist.

The library in my home town is in the middle of dividing their graphic novel section up between kids and young adults/adults. It reeeally needed to be done. Right now, they have a copy of Watchmen in the kids section. And by kids, I do mean grade school kids. O_o

The new section has everything else- more mature manga, Powers, Cerberus, etc.

I think this is the prefered way to go.

Keffria wrote:Man, out of all the manga they could've criticized... I can think of titles that are infinitely worse...

Bondage Fairies!

Oh, c'mon, just admit it. The Japanese are as evil as the Pokemon they spawned.

The whole problem is that adults still haven't gotten it through their heads that just because a story is presented graphically doesn't mean it's for kids. They shouldn't be outraged at the producers for making it, rather at the libraries who file materials solely by genre and not by content.

M2 wrote:they aren't even reading the material they're accusing

That's really nothing new.

Not to mention there is much more graphic material available in libraries, and have been so for many years!

By which, of course, I mean National Geographic Magazine.

(c'mon, you know what I'm talking about...)

wp wrote:Oh, c'mon, just admit it. The Japanese are as evil as the Pokemon they spawned.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Peach Girl was created by an American. I don't actually read it so. . .

we must keep our children from knowing about things that exist in the world but aren't wonderful.

how dare our children read about things they could see on the news.

how dare they read comics which mirror our newspapers.

our kids must retain their innocence, so when they hit adulthood they're either really nieve, or really jaded.

it's the american way!

sincerely wrote:

wp wrote:Oh, c'mon, just admit it. The Japanese are as evil as the Pokemon they spawned.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Peach Girl was created by an American. I don't actually read it so. . .

I don't think I will correct you... I'll let you write in agony and doubt! Who was the author? Was she Japanese... or American? Was it really a female? Or just a man who watched too many soap operas? Muahahahahaha!

"As I was going through it, I said, 'Oh my God, do parents know what their kids are reading?'" mother Raynelle White said.

"I don't want to see it; I don't want her seeing it," Travis White said. "The whole time, I'm like, 'I can't believe we're seeing these things.'"

Why don't these parents sit down and actually talk to their kids about this stuff instead of attacking the library, author, random bystander.

The stupidity of these people really worries me sometimes.

*looks at wp funny*

Her name is Miwa Ueda, she's Japanese, and I'm SO glad her comic is done in black and white, because her colors are HORRIBLE.