In considering the effect and impact of Itch No. 2 the
Tribunal notes the information given to it that the 6,500
copies have been distributed principally through direct sales
by children to other children.

The purpose of the publication is stated on the inside
of the front cover thus:

“Education should help people understand their position
or role in society and help them to learn how they can
change this role. It should also teach them the nature of
that society and give them some kind of insight into what
they can do to change it.

The present education system in New Zealand does none
of these things for the majority of students. Fortunately it
has alienated some of us enough to make it worth our
while to teach ourselves some of these things.

However, we are privileged in that we were born white
and upper middle class and thus learnt to read and discern
in an education system that is designed for, and to perpetuate,
the class that we came from. We are also lucky in that we
have access to a large amount of information and publications.

Itch is attempting to fill these deliberate gaps in our
society. Itch is also hoping to give young people the chance
to express themselves without fear of censorship or re-crimination.”

The presentation and discussion of sexual experience in
two of the articles has been the principal matter in respect
of which the question of possible indecency has arisen. This
material is clearly related to the latter of the two aims
identified in the last of the paragraphs quoted above, although
the more substantial article is not original to this publication,
but derived from an Australian publication. The relationship
of this sexual material to the first of the stated aims is
more elusive, the chief concern of the articles being personal
pleasure rather than social activism. In the submissions by
the publishers, including the evidence called on their behalf
and the statements by Dr Margaret Sparrow and the Rev.
Robert Scott handed to the Tribunal, the informative purpose
of the sexual material was put before the Tribunal as the
basis for the submission that no restriction was justified.
This contention is now examined.

The Tribunal has considered numerous publications for
which an educative purpose has been claimed and has a
clear view of what is acceptable, and what is not acceptable,
within the Act. For instance, in respect of illustrated sex
instruction books it stated the lines of its approach in
decisions No. 432-5. The Tribunal has drawn a distinction
in other decisions between publications which genuinely
inform and those which seek to “get at” people. A principal
test which the Tribunal has applied to publications in this
field is that of objectivity. Sex information imparted in a
straightforward, natural manner, and in a tone appropriate
to the complexity of human sexual experience and to the
privacy normally accorded it, meets that test. Decisions of
the Tribunal make clear that in its view frankness and
fullness in the instruction given are served by, and not
prevented by, the maintaining of such standards of objectivity.
On the other hand, discussions of sexual experience which
betray by their furtiveness or their prurience a desire to
exploit rather than to inform have not been accepted.

The two articles in question in this issue of Itch lack such
objectivity and sensitivity. The tone of the article giving a
teacher’s account of her discussions with her class has an
emphasis on the pleasures of the teacher’s own sexual
experience and the excitement of her daring to divulge it
that allows no place for educating children about sex in
a positive responsible way. In the second article the satisfying
of curiosity and the offering of advice at a crudely
physical level is the chief concern. The pursuit of sexual
gratification for its own sake dominates, children being told
not to be afraid “to explore the possibilities of all sorts
of relationships whatever society says”. The relationships
envisaged have been outlined in the crude language that
pervades the article.

In another article and its accompanying illustration the
primacy of aggressive sexual explicitness in creating and
sustaining magazines of this kind is emphasised, and the
informative purpose claimed for the sexual material is thereby
further rendered suspect. The cover contributes in a minor
way to this view also. When other matters are considered-
particularly the age group amongst whom the magazine is
intended to be sold and the method of distribution-the
offensiveness of the publication and its capacity to harm
clearly go beyond the mere affronting of propriety and good
taste. This publication diminishes human sexuality to an
impulse to be followed wherever it leads and pushes that

view upon children. The public good requires that such
blatant irresponsibility be restrained. Nothing in the rest of
the publication offsets the dominant emphasis of this injurious
treatment of sex.

The Tribunal classifies this issue of this magazine as
indecent.

R. S. V. SIMPSON, Chairman.

14 December 1973.

No. 767-786

Decision of the Indecent Publications Tribunal

IN the matter of the Indecent Publications Act 1963, and
in the matter of a reference to the Tribunal under section 12
(1) of the said Act by the Magistrate’s Court at Wellington
for a decision and report in terms of the said section in
respect of the following comic books: Binky Brown Meets
the Holy Virgin Mary, published by Last Gasp Eco Funnies,
California, Armageddon, published by Barney Steel and Last
Gasp Inc., California, Dopin Dan, published by Last Gasp
Eco Funnies, California, Big Ass, published by Rip Off
Press, California, Greaser, published by Half Ass Press,
California, If the Shoe fits No. 2, published by Fits Collective,
California, Slow Death No. 2, published by Last Gasp Eco
Funnies, California, Slow Death No. 3, published by Last
Gasp Eco Funnies, California, The Tortoise and the Hare,
published by Last Gasp Eco Funnies, California, Up from
the Deep, published by Rip Off Press, California, Legion
of Charlies, published by Last Gasp Eco Funnies, California,
Skull Vol. 1 No. 2, published by Last Gasp Eco Funnies,
California, Skull No. 3, published by Last Gasp Eco Funnies,
California, Motor City published by R. Crumb Productions,
Thrilling Murder, Young Lust No. 1, published by Last
Gasp, California, Young Lust No. 3, published by Last
Gasp, California, Mother’s Oats, published by Rip Off Press,
California, Merton of the Movement, published by Last Gasp
Eco Funnies, California, Tales of the Armorkins, published
by CO and Sons Publishing Co., California.

Mr Drury, solicitor, appeared on behalf of the Collector
of Customs and made submissions. Mr Taylor, a party to
the Court proceedings, appeared and made submissions.

DECISION AND REPORT

20 comic books

Each of these comics is, in the Tribunal’s view, likely
to have a damaging and corrupting influence upon children.
Some of the books could also be harmful to other sections
of the community for whom this form of literature has
appeal, namely adolescents and the semi-literate sections of
the adult population.

In a large number of these comics sex, violence, horror,
and crime are depicted in gross and explicit detail, and
although the number of objectionable frames varies greatly
between the comics, the Tribunal considers that their explicit-
ness, wherever they occur, makes all of the comics equally
unsuitable for children. Some of the books express a strong
political view, but even where the satirical purpose is most
in evidence there is sufficient that is objectionable in the
treatment and presentation of sex, violence, or crime to
render these books unacceptable as possible reading for young
children.

Some of the comics are deemed to be so offensive in
their treatment of sex and violence as to render them indecent
for all readers. Included in this group are Thrilling Murders
No. 1, Greaser No. 1, The Legion of Charlies, Young Lust,
No. 2 and 3, Armageddon, Up from the Deep, and Big
Ass Comic, Slow Death No. 3 and Skull, No. 2 and 3.
In the first three comics mentioned, there is an overriding
emphasis upon violence, horror, and cruelty. Sex is the
main concern of the remainder. Although The Legion of
Charlies and Slow Death No. 3 are clearly satirical, this
element is considered to be undermined by the undue
emphasis upon violence and sex.

In the second group of comics of this set, the number
of frames depicting violence and sex is much more limited
and more related to the satirical purpose which in each book
is clearly discernible. The comics belonging to this group
are Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary, If The
Shoe Fits, Motor City Comics, Slow Death No. 2 and The
Tortoise and the Hare. The Tribunal is of the opinion,
however, that children, adolescents, and the semi-literate are
unlikely to grasp the meaning or purpose of the comics
and are therefore likely merely to dwell upon the images