Comment by mapt
11 hours ago
In addition to the drawn cartoon precedent, the idea that purely written fictional literature can fall into the Constitutional obscenity exception as CSAM was tested in US courts in US v Fletcher and US v McCoy, and the authors lost their cases.
Half a million Harry|Malfoy authors on AO3 are theoretically felonies.
I can find a "US v Fletcher" from 2008 that deals with obscenity law, though the only "US v McCoy" I can find was itself about charges for CSAM. The latter does seem to reference a previous case where the same person was charged for "transporting obscene material" though I can't find it.
That being said, I'm not sure I've seen a single obscenity case since Handly which wasn't against someone with a prior record, piled on charges, or otherwise simply the most expedient way for the government to prosecute someone.
As you've indicated in your own comment here, there's been many, many things over the last few decades that fall afoul the letter of the law yet which the government doesn't concern itself with. That itself seems to tell us something.