As part of a mysterious web-development project about which I am Not At Liberty To Speak, I have an RSS feed of news stories running through some filtering algorithms and dumping onto a local intranet page. That’s how I noticed this story on WikiNews.

The Hong Kong Television and Entertainment Licensing Authority (TELA) has received more than 1,700 complaints calling for the Bible to be reclassified as “indecent”, following a heated controversy sparked by the sex column of an university student magazine, which was classified by the government classification tribunal as “indecent”.

Apparently, the Obscene Articles Tribunal (OAT) slapped a “Category II: Indecent” rating upon a student newspaper for publishing an article which asked readers if they ever fantasized about incest and/or bestiality. This means that the students publishing the newspaper will have a criminal record. Enough people got irritated by this that somebody started www.truthbible.net, whose legal disclaimer reads as follows:

THIS WEBSITE CONTAINS BIBLE MATERIAL WHICH MAY OFFEND AND MAY NOT BE DISTRIBUTED, CIRCULATED, SOLD, HIRED, GIVEN, LENT,SHOWN, PLAYED OR PROJECTED TO A PERSON UNDER THE AGE OF 18 YEARS.

Reuters says that if TELA classifies the Bible as “Category II: Indecent,” only people 18 or older will be able to buy them, and all Bibles will have to be sold sealed in wrappers with statutory warning notices. TELA, says Reuters, is still deliberating.

Rumors that this story will be featured on the next Colbert Report remain unconfirmed (mostly because I just made them up).