5ch and Yahoo is right-leaning, yes. Especially the former.

Twitter is a bit mixed, it really depends on your algorithm. FB I think leans left, Reddit is definitely left.

As you pointed out, many Japanese people tend to present themselves as apolitical in public or offline settings.
At the same time, mainstream mass media in Japan has long been perceived as leaning toward left-leaning or progressive narratives.

In that context, online spaces such as 5ch and Yahoo! comment sections have become places where people with conservative or right-leaning views feel more able to express themselves openly. As a result, these views can appear disproportionately visible, even outside explicitly political discussions.

As you may already know, Japan has historically taken a restrained stance in diplomatic matters. In recent years, however, issues such as mass tourism, immigration, and demographic change have created growing frustration among people with more conservative views. When these concerns are perceived as being downplayed or framed one-sidedly by mainstream media—often emphasizing restraint or compromise on the part of Japanese citizens—it can push politically aware individuals toward more overtly conservative positions.

These sentiments tend to surface more clearly in online discussions. While many people in Japan remain largely apolitical, recent election trends suggest that Japanese society as a whole may be gradually shifting in a more conservative direction.

Beyond Japan, I don’t feel confident enough to make strong claims. However, from the limited impressions I have, it seems possible that similar debates over immigration and national identity are also shaping political discourse in other developed countries. I mention this only as a tentative observation, not as a firm conclusion.

What is written in the comment section on yahoo news and 5ch are more or less a saturated version of the mainstream non-elite view of Japanese politics. The idea that Japanese are apolitical is just a prodigious stereotype originating from lack of communication. We don’t show our political views on strangers. This is one of several basic etiquette of interaction when hanging out here. Online media is anonymous so such rules do not apply so you would hear a more or less an extreme version of what they think. You know. Writing extreme things grabs attention.

Also our basic etiquette is that you don’t talk or opinion about something you aren’t completely familiar with. Internet completely destroyed that. Add that with sensationalism, you get what the OP is concerned about. Reddit is no different in that regard. I’ve seen quite messed up opinions here and there as well. This is online stuff, not some regional stuff.

One major difference between Japan and say, the US, is that we don’t have much extreme leftest active here. I think there are two reasons. One is that Japan had huge strikes and left wing terrorism in the later part of 20th centuries. Associated with left wing extremism is too risky even done online. You’ll end up being ghosted by all your friends. Another reason is that leftist politics seems to be strong in region with heavy influence of Christianity. I think the whole idea of distributing resources equally to all people is a Christian or abrihamisnic idea. Japan had similar movement rising from Bhuddism, but they were not as strict and logically rigid as Christianity.

One last thing I can add here is that we have this thing called 公安, basically a Japanese form of public safety police with roots from the pre-war 特別高等警察 (Special higher police) which during occupation was dismantled as the allied view them as thought police. Being a radical leftist would likely be under the radar of this public apparatus and if so you will be ghosted by all your friends, families, and your job as no one want to be marked by them.

Most Japanese in general are conservative, if that’s your definition of right wing then yes

It’s possible to be conservative and have “left wing” ideas and policies in mind

First, it's important to understand that political leanings vary greatly depending on the message board on 5chan, and that 5chan itself mass-produces threads to churn out rage-baiting articles by affiliate marketing companies.

In my opinion, more than half of online right-wing discourse in Japan consists of extreme headlines generated for the purpose of making money.

They engage in a lot of rage-baiting on Twitter, 5chan, YouTube Shorts, TikTok, and other platforms. Recently, they've been using AI to mass-produce false videos and actively make extreme statements to gain viewership, and current government official Takaichi is actively using this to drum up support.

And the people who like these articles are elderly people and ignorant young people who have lost faith in television and believe they can find the truth on the internet.

Algorithms tend to limit political opinions to extremists, while others tend not to express them at all.

For example, political topics are unlikely to appear on the timeline of a Twitter account that only talks about music.

Therefore, you can't see a country's trends based solely on the information you see. Voter turnout is very low, and the majority of those who vote do not have strong opinions. That said, the Liberal Democratic Party has always held power, and conservatives continue to maintain a certain degree of influence. While there were many radical leftists 10 years ago, they no longer have much of an online presence, as rage-baiters have exploited them to mass-produce opponents (radical right-wingers).

Conservatives today are also somewhat puzzling in many ways, and there are MAGA-esque people who hold views far removed from those of typical conservatives, such as those who support the Unification Church, a Korean cult religion, and the actions of Trump. These people are known as netouyo, and are at odds with traditional conservatives.

The Japanese are a strange people.

Although we say we are non-religious, we still stand in long lines at shrines to pray during the precious New Year holidays.

So even people who say they're non-partisan actually have their own opinions.

Regarding immigration, I think that many people have spent most of their lives surrounded by only Japanese people, so they unconsciously don't want many immigrants to come in. They just don't say it publicly.

I think you can express pretty right wing opinions while still considering yourself apolitical. And generally I find most younger Japanese people I speak to consider themselves apolitical but a strong portion of them definitely hold some conservative opinions. Not sure if that's half or more but definitely feels like a lot sometimes.

I think generally people here seem to fall on the right but it's never black and white with these things.

As in all countries. People with higher levels of education here are generally less conservative and overall more progressive.

I think it's more that the Western internet is extremely left-wing because any opinion that is perceived as potentially "right" is snuffed out. so many moderate people who may lean slightly more to the right would be pushed into echo chambers where ironically their moderate opinions slowly turn into extreme ones. whereas in Japan you don't really have a very strong "left", so people who lean more right (both moderately and also more extreme) can talk openly.

You just described the whole world.

The low resolution of the term “foreigners” as used by Japanese mass media and Reddit users.

Mixing “netto-uyoku” with mainstream conservatism is an issue that repeatedly causes confusion even inside Japan, and it’s frankly frustrating to see it done so casually.
This distinction matters and deserves more careful treatment.

Japan is a conservative country, run by politicians who are the under the thumb of the Unification Church.

Most Japanese people are apolitical but in general, they lean right.

There are many books and academic studies on this. But it's a phenomenon dating back to the 90s in which right wing extremists are vocal online. The people who are apolitical or neutral are relatively silent.

What makes this phenomenon unique to Japan is that the online right wing mainly consists of wealthy men in their 30s to 50s. They also tend to have college education, are married, and have kids. They are also high earners with solid social status and typically works in middle management.

Most Japanese people with full time jobs don’t have the time or energy for online BS. It’s mostly retirees, hikikomori, and temp workers who spend hours online, and they’re the ones who tend to hold the most extreme views on both the right and the left. Both sides can be absolutely unhinged.

I think the Japanese internet in general tends to be less censorious and so they don't ban people as often as western sites do. Western sites used to feel about the same but I think it was right around the time of covid they started to become extremely censorious and everyone fragmented back into smaller groups.

I wouldn't consider any online discourse to be representative of normal political opinions. There's a lot of zealots online and they'll set up bots or lead campaigns to make it seem like their opinions are what everyone believes but in reality it's a small percentage of people.

Oh you’ll be surprised by the number of people who are like MAGA but for Japan.

Most of Japanese people are kind of right. See the support rate of Takaichi.

It's an embarrassing trend, explained on wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netto-uyoku

Nowadays, I think people can be fairly apolitical but still very vocal. The internet throws crap at you all day and provides a platform to respond anonymously. People just spill whatever they're feeling.

It's not a good thing and has contributed massively to the toxic political divides that we now see in many countries. Society functioned better when normal people kept their shittiest opinions to themselves, especially Japan, which always prized itself on "keeping the peace" above all else.

Seeing something strange or distressing on 5ch and then asking a question about Reddit is just running from one absurd echo chamber to the other extreme. The people on both platforms tend to be ideologically opposed so you won't get an honest impression of either side. With regards to who actually represents Japan you can say with almost complete certainty that the people you're seeing on 5ch are Japanese or at the very least are in Japan. You cannot say the same for Reddit.

5chan and Twitter are but they’re a bunch of losers online

The reality is most young people in Japan either are ignorant to politics or don’t care and will generally just have vague opinions about what makes life better

Can I just ask what sort of opinions you'd class as right wing in these cases?

That's because you're a leftist. You consider opinions to the right of your own to be right-wing.

For example, you use anti-China as an example of right-wing, that is as absurd as saying that everyone who is not anti-Russia is right-wing. And anti-immigration sentiment is also not limited to right-wingers.

I do not necessarily think that the japanese right wing is more vocal than the left wing. I would agree that depending on the platform, right wing people are more vocal and easy to recognize because they are just nationalistic and identifiable. At least they are almost anywhere.

But In fact the lefties are quite active on X as well. They have achieved trend words/hashtags on X/Twitter multiple times. I wouldn't say they are more vocal but their existence can't be ignored. They are more vocal for the demographic.

Comments critical of China are deleted on Reddit. This doesn't happen on 5ch.

Internet spaces such as 5chan have traditionally been strongly associated with right-wingers. The reason for this is unclear, but it may be because people in socially vulnerable positions tend to be more aggressive online and are more likely to be associated with thoughts that exclude others.

Not really internet but if you are genuinely curious about how the political situation in japan handles the far right and their idiocy, the recent elections show that the far right party was largely a reject with no real meaningful support. They were viewed mostly as annoying agitators and loudmouths, and have mostly been treated as an embarassing joke, falling for american idiocy because they don't really care about Japan.

Sanae-san(Current PM), and media outfit has been very careful to not bare blame of problems in Japan on foreigners.
Even if there's a lot of loudmouths on the internet, it's not good a reflection of the general character of Japan, like it has become for America where this behavior is largely enabled in real life quite often.

The anti immigrint crowd mostly looks idiotic and tbh quite a lot of it is being stoked by racist americans on youtube anyways. There has been quite a lot of people trying to really paint Japan as this terribly messed up place because of all the misbehaving and problematic immigrints. using thumbnails and doctored photos to try to stoke negative reactions towards immigration.
The reality is that the only japanese people who have any care for what foreigners have to say are the open progressive types which will simply ignore this stupidity or point out this stupidity, or the rightwinger idiots who are waiting for anything to be angry about and took the bait.
Not to mention the amount of conservatives who also just outright disdain Japan being portrayed badly in any way...

TLDR: They're loudmouths, and the japanese idea of conservative isn't like most of the rest of the world.

大半が右翼性向だが、現実では無関心なふりをするだけだろ？ｗ

5ch (5ch summary blogs) or Yahoo! comments are basically like Truth Social. More liberal-leaning spaces would be places like Hatena Bookmark or NanJ.

Not nearly as vocal as left wingers on Reddit

There are both right wing and left wing community on major website.
I usually use twitter but on that site there are both right wing and left wing people.

well, you have to remember that from the early 1920 there was a purge of communist. first they tortured and killed them, later "just" making them ostracized without jobs and making them as outlaws.

Yes lol. It always amuses me how some far leftists love living in Japanese society but fail to understand the mindset and societal groupthink required for that society to exist as it does.

Take their stance on drugs for a simple example. Toughness on crime is quite a rightwing ideal. Complete abolition strict penalties is the norm. Societally few outcasts are actually interested in using even just cannabis. Vast majority of people want nothing to do with it and no drugs in their society.

This applies to many areas. If many could actually speak Japanese. Reading real genuine Japanese news (not your English language Japan times with heavy American western left leaning bias).

Whoever is choosing the articles to publish in Japan Times and other English language Japanese papers have an agenda to push likely they are foreign themselves and if course want to bring to attention foreigner in Japan type issues naturally.

Are you asking about ethnically Japanese or people who live in Japan? What do you mean by “right-wing” users and comments?

Japan like nearly everyone has a misconception of the nature of power and success. Japan needs to revisit its Zen clarity. Bamboo waving in the wind. The cherry blossom over the iphone. The garden over the corporate headquarters.like leaves falling on water.

There are a lot of right-wing netizens on the Japanese internet, but even more so, cynicism is rampant. Anyone who loudly proclaims what is correct or moral is frowned upon as a "hypocrite."

This used to be more pronounced in Japan than in other countries, but since Trump it's become the same all over the world.

On the other hand, for example, the "嫌儲(kenmou)" board on 5ch is a mixture of despair and pessimism about Japanese society, and is generally left-wing. There was also a movement to exclude netouyo on a board called Nan J.

Is the homogenous environment in Japan causes Western-inspired Anime fail to include Black people in Co-Protagonist Narratives featured with White co-protagonists? An example would be Lethal Weapon movies where both a Black and White Cop are the Co-Protags with Near-Equal Screen Time. I love to see Black people play prominent roles in Western-style Fantasy worlds like this ENG Web Novel, Threads of Twilight and Ebony here, so I hope Japan takes note, because Black men love White women and Western culture too >>> https://medium.com/@reyesmirz115/black-anime-protagonist-meets-japanese-isekaid-man-kenjirou-again-in-threads-of-twilight-ebony-7bf92c7a510e

Why reddit is constantly forcefeeding in my mouth political slop from every sub existing, no matter how many I mute ?

redditで情報を得るほどくだらないことはないぞ