BERLIN (AP) \u2014 The Swedish government promised on Friday to fight the sale of childlike sex dolls online after instances of such commerce had been reported earlier in the country. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think I react on behalf of all parents when I say that, as a mother, your heart really breaks watching these images and pictures of these dolls,\u201d Sweden\u2019s Minister for Social Services, Camilla Waltersson Gr\u00f6nvall, told The Associated Press. <\/p>\n
The Swedish government wants \u201cto make sure these products cannot any more be sold and bought anywhere,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
She spoke after a meeting which the Swedish government convened on Friday \u201cin response to several notable cases of e-commerce companies selling childlike sex dolls,\u201d according to a statement by her ministry. Child protection groups, online vendors and government agencies participated. <\/p>\n
The online platforms described the measures they are taking to make sure these kinds of products are no longer sold online, Waltersson Gr\u00f6nvall said. <\/p>\n
Asked whether the ministry considers those measures sufficient, Waltersson Gr\u00f6nvall said: \u201cI have been very clear that we will follow this very closely and we will not hesitate to take further action, which might involve further legislation if that is considered necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n
She said the government was preparing a strategy on protecting children from violence, which included steps to prevent sexual and online abuse. <\/p>\n
The online sale of the disputed dolls in Sweden came to the public\u2019s attention after the child protection group ChildX filed a police report against Amazon and several other e-commerce platforms earlier this month over the sale of sex dolls with a clear childlike appearance.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe products, approximately one meter in length, are often dressed in school uniforms and marketed in a sexualized context,\u201d the group said. \u201cSwedish legislation prohibits material that portrays children in a sexualized manner. The sale or distribution of lifelike child-like sex dolls may thus fall under criminal provisions related to child sexual exploitation.\u201d<\/p>\n
ChildX Secretary General Ida \u00d6stensson, also speaking by phone to the AP, said that \u201cour police complaint against Amazon and other sites for selling child-like sex dolls, together with public advocacy, led to the removal of these listings on Amazon.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are taking this step because these products are designed to sexualize children,\u201d said \u00d6stensson. \u201cTheir open sale and marketing fuel a culture that normalizes the sexual abuse of children. This is unacceptable. Children should never be commodified for sexual purposes.\u201d<\/p>\n
When reached by email, online vendor Amazon said it did not have anything to share beyond what it had previously told other media, which was that the company would attend Friday\u2019s meeting and had taken products that had been flagged offline. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe have strict policies and guidelines in the segment of adult products and we have always strictly prohibited child pornography,\u201d an Amazon spokesperson was quoted by French daily Le Monde on Nov. 12.<\/p>\n
In November, France\u2019s government said<\/a> it was moving toward suspending access to the Shein online marketplace until it proves its content conforms to French law, after authorities found illegal weapons and child-like sex dolls<\/a> for sale on the fast-fashion giant\u2019s website.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n Claudia Ciobanu reported from from Warsaw, Poland. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BERLIN (AP) \u2014 The Swedish government promised on Friday to fight the sale of childlike sex dolls online…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318721,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[12300,28,163320,163321,21370,793,163322,851,6804,39779,965],"class_list":{"0":"post-318720","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-amazon-com","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-camilla-waltersson-grnvall","11":"tag-claudia-ciobanu","12":"tag-consumer-products-and-services","13":"tag-general-news","14":"tag-ida-stensson","15":"tag-inc","16":"tag-sweden","17":"tag-sweden-government","18":"tag-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318720"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318720\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}