diff --git a/django/db/backends/mysql/base.py b/django/db/backends/mysql/base.py
index 7475f5d1f7..9b82a1c8f0 100644
--- a/django/db/backends/mysql/base.py
+++ b/django/db/backends/mysql/base.py
@@ -51,18 +51,6 @@ django_conversions.update({
     FIELD_TYPE.DECIMAL: util.typecast_decimal,
     FIELD_TYPE.NEWDECIMAL: util.typecast_decimal,
 })
-if hasattr(FIELD_TYPE, "VARCHAR"):
-    # By default, MySQLdb will return VARCHAR BINARY fields as type str.
-    # This is a bad idea, as BINARY doesn't indicate that it's arbitrary
-    # binary data, but that collation uses the binary representation.
-    # Replacing the list makes it return unicode. MySQLdb later adds
-    # another list entry for non-binary fields.
-    #
-    # MySQLdb 1.2.1p2 doesn't have the VARCHAR attribute, but it also returns
-    # unicode for VARCHAR BINARY columns automatically, so we don't need it
-    # there.
-    django_conversions[FIELD_TYPE.VARCHAR] = [(FLAG.BINARY,
-            lambda s: s.decode('utf-8'))]
 
 # This should match the numerical portion of the version numbers (we can treat
 # versions like 5.0.24 and 5.0.24a as the same). Based on the list of version