Someone recently asked on the Unseen Japan Discord server: Why does Japan not have the equivalent of Fox News?
That got me thinking about a larger topic: Why has Japan’s far right been left behind?
The controversial comments this week from a famous anime voice actress got a lot of other people talking about this, too. The rhetoric that Hayashibara Megumi was spouting came directly from right-wing South Korean YouTubers. Japanese far-right activists have used the exact same language on their own YouTube channels and in social media posts.
Despite their prevalence online, however, the far right in Japan had made little electoral headway. Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has a far-right contingent that often keeps the country’s policies at a slight socially rightward slant. (It’s a key reason marriage equality still isn’t a reality in Japan.)
Besides that small foothold, however, the far-right can’t brag of any other large political wins. The LDP leadership, while it has some terrible members (coughAso Tarocough), is mostly staid and traditional. A member of the far-right arm, Takahashi Sanae, came close to seizing party leadership and becoming Prime Minister but was rebuffed in favor of current PM Ishiba Shigeru.
In terms of actual far-right parties, there are two: Sanseito and the Conservative Party. Both have a grand total of six seats in Japan’s powerful 465-member Lower House. While the most popular party in last year’s elections, the Democratic Party For the People, leans right, it can’t be termed anything close to a “far-right party” given its stance on issues such as separate spousal surnames and the adult video law.
