A shocking censorship bill was unanimously passed by Republicans in Texas that would effectively make it a jailable offense to own or look at many manga series.

The new bill would purportedly make it a crime to own a multitude of popular Japanese manga – including Goblin Slayer, Fruits Basket, and many others. The office of Lt. Governor Dan Patrick posted in support of the bill right after it passed the Senate, and will soon head to the governor’s office to be signed.

The bill in question is Senate Bill 20. Sponsored by GOP senator Pete Flores, the bill, in its own words, “creates a new state offense for the possession or promotion of obscene material that appears to depict a child younger than 18 years old, regardless of whether the depiction is of an actual child, cartoon or animation, or an image created using an artificial intelligence application or other computer software.”

Furthermore, subparagraph c of the bill states: “An offense under this section is a state jail felony,” directing first-time offenders convicted under this law to a minimum of five years in prison, simply for owning or viewing such material.

As many responses have pointed out, many popular manga would be banned in Texas if this law is signed into law, which certainly seems like it will at this point. Goblin Slayer is the example many are pointing to, due to the infamous assault scenes of characters by goblins in the early issues.

But even tamer manga’s like Fruits Basket could be criminalized under this law, depending on how broad a judge or state prosecutor wishes to interpret “sexual acts” in a court of law. Only children’s manga’s such as Pokémon and Sailor Moon seem to be safe under a literal reading of the law.

Unfortunately, this law in Texas is just the latest escalation in a culture war on anime that has been escalating for the past few years.

Moms For Liberty, a conservative organization which had previously focused on removing LGBT books from school libraries, has recently begun to push for the removal of “degenerate” anime such as Unico and Assassination Classroom.

Highly influential pundits like The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh have also been attacking men who watch anime, calling the entire medium satanic and saying only obese men like it.

Hopefully, this law will be overturned by The Supreme Court. Nichegamer will keep you informed of all developments as the story progresses.