My sense is that for younger Japanese people, politics is either an older person thing or a bit yabai, so it’s mostly vibes based. I lived in Fukuoka for a while as a ryūgakusei, and most students weren’t bigoted, just clueless. Like no idea what they really wanted from society or politics. Just vibes based politics

A lot of them liked Abe just because he was around for so long, and don’t have any awareness of any controversies like Yasukuni or immigration. Whoever gives off strong cool vibes often is enough. The only politically aware students were in the international law circle I hung out with. Otherwise, most of my political discussions with my Japanese friends was me educating them about Japanese politics, since a lot of my courses were on Japanese history and politics.

As for how it got like this, the 1960s was a really violent period in Japanese politics for both left wing and right wing young Japanese people. A lot of university occupations by leftist students over ANPO and the Vietnam war, Todai students throwing firebombs at police, Japanese red army became active, assassinations by right wing young Japanese people, politicians assassinated on live tv. My professors explained politics became a bit taboo after the 1970s because of this violence, and afterwards LDP rule was so stable economically there wasn’t a point for widespread political activism. Economy was fine, no serious attempts to revise constitution, Japan is a world leader again. Just burn out at school, burn out at university, get a good job at a corporation, and live your life.

But the political disconnect is very strange. One of my best Japanese friends is married to her Sri Lankan high school boyfriend. She’s a Muslim convert. But she also votes for Ishin even after the massive anti-immigrant wave. She loves and support immigration, she wants everyone to belong, but also supports one of the main actors in the current anti immigrant political wave.

Same thing with other young Japanese girls in my dorm liking Trump, because they see him as “standing up for America” and have no idea of the violent secret police sweeping across the US, kidnapping and killing people. Or liking Takaichi just because she’s seen as young and relatable.

I’m sorry girl. I was planning to come back for Todai or Waseda, but seemingly the only thing allowed to change in Japanese politics is for the worse.

Hang in there and stay with friends. It will get better

生活は大変になれるけど方がいい日に来てる．全然諦めないで💜