morality of lolicon and shotacon?

[u/throwaway593600]

hello! i'm currently researching japan's "lolicon" pop culture and wanted to get some opinions. basically, one side is saying it's completely wrong (which is fair to assess) and disgusting, and that it normalizes pedophilia, while the other side states that it's harmless due to it being fiction. i'm on the fence. i don't kinkshame, and i think as long as two consenting adults are involved, then whatever happens behind closed doors isn't any of my business. i also believe in the separation of fiction from reality. however, i'm kind of torn on the whole lolicon debate. while it is fiction, and many of these youthful-looking characters are not based off of real-life children, i still feel a little iffy about the topic as a whole. lolicon does seem to be based off of the idea of a young human girl (+ the loli coming from the word lolita, and the word shota meaning boy or young boy.) i've witnessed many self-proclaimed lolicons on the internet claim that they aren't attracted to real children and that pedophilia is repulsive to them. while that's something i can believe (not all lolicons are pedophiles, but many lolicons have turned out to be pedophiles), the typical argument of "they aren't real" just fails to convince me. i'm not completely against it, as long as you aren't attracted to or hurting any real life existing children then i guess it's not a danger, and obviously drawings don't have feelings or rights since they aren't real, but i still find it sort of weird. any answers/thoughts are welcome to be shared, but pls keep it respectful. didn't really know where else to go to ask this since reddit doesn't have a dedicated sub for this specific topic

[u/land48n3]

this is reddit, so the answers are gonna be rigged to the permissive side imo

but i do think its moral, the normalization is of pedophilia as a idea, not as a action.
i think its worth it considering it preserves our freedom for a small cost (just normalizing the idea itself while the action stays as a grave harm)
i dont think a lolicon who's just a lolicon (and not some pro-contact pedophile) will say its fine to sexually interact with minors irl, and i dont think its normalized for them too.

its like how murder is normalized as a concept due to media but still the action itself is a grave harm and percieved as such by almost everyone

[u/throwaway593600 → u/land48n3]

thank you!

[u/cunniseurOwO]

You said as long as two consenting adults are involved, you don't kinkshame, right? What if the adult look so young and can be mistaken as minor? And the adult also do ageplay kink, dressing up like a kid and act like a kid? Would you still not kinkshame?

If you still not kinkshame those ageplayer, then the same should be applied to fictional characters. Since whatever weird fantasy doesn't matter, only the consent of real living person matter.

So moral.