Christian lawyers and comics. Cartoon of 19/05/2024 in CTXT
Translation of the cartoon: "Father, forgive them, for they do not know how to distinguish a comic book for adults".
On 17 May, the foundation "Abogados Cristianos" announced a lawsuit against the cartoonist Julio A. Serrano,"Don Julio" and the publishing house Fandogamia for the comic "El niño Jesús no odia a los mariquitas" for alleged crimes of "provocation to discrimination and hatred, and sexual provocation".
I confess that I already feel lazy having to write the same things about the same thing over and over again, but it never hurts to do so because the denouncers only seek to create a discouragement effect. Or what amounts to the same thing, a warning to all concerned so that the next artist who considers touching on certain subjects will think about it and end up censoring himself.
The discouragement effect, legally speaking, is a way of referring to the indirect dissuasive result on the exercise of a fundamental right produced by the criminal sanction of an unlawful conduct, but very close to those protected by the right in question, which is why it is considered that resorting to criminal law to sanction these excesses is disproportionate and on many occasions even beyond the point of absurdity.
The Yisus Foundation of lawyers, experts in losing lawsuits, know a lot about this and use it as an excuse behind the prehistoric and very repealable, at least reformable, articles 524 and 525 of the Penal Code to continue with their medieval crusade against abortion, euthanasia or anything that contains criticism or parody with any relation to the church or religion. They exploit and twist as much as they can the particular interpretation of blasphemy renamed"crime against religious feelings" in the Penal Code.
"El niño Jesús no odia a los mariquitas" is a comic for adults by Julio A. Serrano. A satirical exercise that denounces homophobia published by Fandogamia and which simulates the appearance of children's colouring books. The first instalment of this series, by the same author, was entitled"Ser fascista está mal" (Being a fascist is wrong).
Well, the fuss is made after a few churretosas notes, because this that many media did cannot be called news, in which a bookseller from Pontevedra is quoted as having said that potatoes and that therefore it is "viral" because Elon Musk has said I don't know what shit. That's all. Journalism to paste a tweet and move on. In none of these initial pieces is the author or the publisher contacted.
What followed was an attempt to make people believe that it was a book for children, some even slipped in that it was distributed in schools, which was absolutely false, and they continued to lie knowingly. Others went much further, and with the hoax in place, they even spoke of paedophiles.
While someone could still claim that the appearance of the publication could give rise to confusion (obvious because it is a parody in the style of a colouring book), the editor of Fandogamia, Pedro F. Molina, did not try to wriggle out of it. Molina didn't try to wriggle out of the issue and explained in detail that the supposed age rating that served as a hooking flag for the garrulos had not come from the publisher, but from the platforms and points of sale, since "in addition to adding the words 'from 6 years old' in capital letters, the phrase "for adults" has been deliberately removed from the description. One would think that someone had gone to the wrong place".
In order not to expand and write what I have already written twenty times and others have written better, I refer you to this entry in Gerardo Vilches' blog, recommended reading for those who still do not know if they are mental adults.
I take this opportunity to remind this new bunch of obtuse people that creative freedom cannot be, and never will be, in the hands of a bunch of ultra-Catholics with the soul of theocrats who, by the way, should be cut off for abusing the judicial system.
And that, as obvious as it may seem to anyone with at least a finger and a half in front of them, any work of fiction has no limits other than those that its author wishes to place on it.
- Issue #161 of The Swindler is dedicated to this issue. Cartoon gallery.
Related:
Humour in trouble, a collection of cases
Cases of cartoonists who have had problems of some importance because of their cartoons or satirical illustrations. There are also some stories of other people who, without being cartoonists, have got into trouble for sharing them.
