Shotacon

Shotacon (ショタコン), sometimes shortened to shota (ショタ), is a Japanese slang portmanteau of the phrase Shōtarō complex (正太郎コンプレックス) and describes an attraction to young boys, or an individual with such an attraction. Outside Japan, the term is used less often with this meaning. It refers to a genre of manga and anime wherein pre-pubescent or pubescent male characters are depicted in a suggestive or erotic manner. It can also apply to postpubescent (adolescent or adult) characters with youthful neotenic features that would make them appear to be younger than they are. The phrase is a reference to the young male character Shōtarō (正太郎) from Tetsujin 28-go (reworked in English as Gigantor). The equivalent term for attraction to (or art pertaining to erotic portrayal of) young girls is lolicon.

The usage of the term in both Western and Japanese fan cultures includes works ranging from explicitly pornographic to mildly suggestive, romantic or entirely nonsexual. As with lolicon, shotacon is related to the concepts of kawaii (cuteness) and moe (in which characters are presented as young, cute or helpless in order to increase reader identification and inspire protective feelings). As such, shotacon themes and characters are used in a variety of non-erotic media. Elements of shotacon, like yaoi, are comparatively common in shōjo manga, such as the popular translated manga Loveless (which features an eroticized but unconsummated relationship between the 12-year-old male protagonist and his 20-year-old male "fighter unit"), or the young-appearing character Honey in Ouran High School Host Club. Seinen manga, particularly that aimed at otaku, also occasionally presents eroticized adolescent males in a non-pornographic context, such as the cross-dressing 16-year-old boy in Yubisaki Milk Tea.

Some critics claim that the shotacon genre contributes to actual sexual abuse of children, while others point out that there is no evidence for this, or that there is evidence to the contrary.

Origins
The term "shotacon" is a Japanese portmanteau of Shōtarō complex (正太郎コンプレックス), a reference to the young male character Shōtarō (正太郎) from Tetsujin 28-go.

In the anime and manga series, Shōtarō is a bold, self-assertive detective who frequently outwits his adversaries and helps to solve cases. Throughout the series, Shōtarō develops close friends within the world. His bishōnen cuteness embodied and formed the term "shotacon", putting a name to an old sexual subculture.

Where the shotacon concept developed is hard to pinpoint, but some of its earliest roots are in readers responses to detective series written by Edogawa Rampo. In his works, a character named Yoshio Kobayashi of "Shōnentanteidan" (Junior Detective Group, similar to the Baker Street Irregulars of Sherlock Holmes) forms a deep dependency with adult protagonist Kogoro Akechi. Kobayashi, a beautiful teenager, constantly concerns himself with Kogoro's cases and well-being, and for a time moves in with the unmarried man. This nonsexual but intimate adult-boy relationship in part inspired the evolution of the shotacon community.

Tamaki Saitō describes the modern shotacon doujinshi community as having largely formed in the early 1980s and having a roughly even split between males and females. Saitō suggests that shotacon was originally an offshoot of yaoi, but when adopted by male readers became influenced by lolicon; thus, he claims "shota texts by female yaoi authors are structurally identical to yaoi texts, while shota by male otaku clearly position these little boys as young girls with penises."

Shotacon publications
Shotacon stories are commonly released in semi-monthly anthologies. Sometimes, however, mangaka will publish individual manga volumes. Many shotacon stories are published as doujinshi; Shotaket (ショタケット), an annual convention to sell shotacon doujin material, was founded in 1995, apparently by a group of male creators. The 2008 Shotaket had over 1000 attendees and offered work from nearly 200 circles.

Shotacon for women is almost exclusively yaoi, and may be published in general yaoi anthology magazines or in one of the few exclusively shotacon yaoi anthologies, such as Shōnen Romance. Because of the possible legal issues, US publishers of yaoi have avoided material depicting notably underage characters. In 2006, Juné released an English translation of Mako Takahashi's Naichaisouyo (泣いちゃいそうよ) under the title "Almost Crying", a non-erotic shotacon manga; the book contains several stories featuring pubescent male characters, but their relationships are nonsexual.

Shotacon for male readers may feature heterosexual relationships ("straight shota") or male-male relationships. Shota stories may be published in (a subset of) general seijin (men's pornographic) manga anthologies or in the few seijin shota manga anthologies, such as Shōnen Ai no Bigaku, which specializes in male-male stories. Some gay men's magazines which offer a particularly broad mix of pornographic material occasionally run stories or manga featuring peri-pubescent characters.

In 2006, the seijin shotacon OVA anime Boku no Pico (ぼくのぴこ), which the producer has described as the first shotacon anime, was released. It was later followed by three sequels. However, three years previously an OVA based on the eroge Enzai was created, featuring explicit sexual acts involving young boys.

Publications against shotacon
In Japan a few works critical of shotacon exist as well. Most of them are not very popular or are not translated for release outside of Japan. One of the few comics in the western world that deals critically with the subjects of shotacon and abuse is the German manga-style comic Losing Neverland.

Legal aspects

 * Legal status of cartoon pornography depicting minors
 * Legal status of Internet pornography
 * Legal status of cartoon pornography
 * Child pornography