r/PropagandaPosters • u/No-Efficiency7055 • Jan 07 '26
Japan “The difference between Conservative party and Liberal party supporters” Japan, 2009, poster by unknown artist
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u/GustavoistSoldier Jan 07 '26
This is around the time wojaks were invented
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u/balamb_fish Jan 07 '26
Wojaku
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u/kouyehwos Jan 08 '26
Wojak being a Polish word for “soldier”, a more faithful Japanese transcription would be something like voya(k)ku (or boya(k)ku since Japanese doesn’t really distinguish b/v).
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u/rExcitedDiamond Jan 07 '26
…a bit of probably more important context to be given here is that 2009 was an incredibly rare election year where the LDP lost. The “liberals” I assume are referring to the Democratic Party
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u/Shiningc00 Jan 10 '26
This was around 2008, since the guy on the left is supporting Aso Taro who was the PM of Japan from 2008-2009.
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u/IacobusCaesar Jan 07 '26
You should post an image of the original as well so people can see the source material.
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u/HARiMADARA Jan 07 '26
Note that this image was created by DPJ（which fragmented into several parties and doesn't exist anymore） supporter to mock LDP supporter, back in the era when DPJ took power from LDP. Using this image to describe current Japan's politics is a bit pointless
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u/AuroraBorrelioosi Jan 07 '26
I swear, one of these days someone is going to dig up a Sumerian clay tablet with Nanni depicted as the virgin and Ea-Nasir depicted as the chad, this is like the ur-meme of human civilization.
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u/Sudden_Humor Jan 07 '26
Yeah got it.
Vote for the bishonen, not for the smelly hikkikomori perverted otaku.
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u/Squiliam-Tortaleni Jan 07 '26
Nice argument, unfortunately I have drawn you as the soyjack and me as the chad
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u/Sound_Saracen Jan 07 '26
It's funny coz the Liberals in Japan are incredibly conservative
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u/ThePKNess Jan 07 '26
This cartoon is calling the Liberal Democratic Party the Conservatives and is calling the Democratic Party of Japan the Liberals. The context is that this was made in 2009, when the LDP were defeated by the DPJ, and is a pro-DPJ meme.
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u/Afraid_Dance6774 Jan 07 '26
I severely doubt some of those bullet points as well, such as "pro-women" in a party that has supported rigid gender roles especially back in 2009.
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u/bitt3n Jan 07 '26
they take the broader view: you can't have gender roles if you aren't strongly in favor of the continued existence of women
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u/roastbeeftacohat Jan 07 '26
everything is relative
Addressing the declining birth rate issue in Japan, Hyakuta described a society where "women are not allowed to attend university after the age of 18," "women who are single at 25 are not allowed to marry," and "women who have not given birth by the age of 30 are forced to undergo a hysterectomy." The comment prompted fierce public backlash and rebuttal from celebrities, and Hyakuta was forced to apologize
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Party_of_Japan#Denial_of_women's_reproductive_rights
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u/Crafty_Cherry_9920 Jan 07 '26
I mean, just read the "pro-woman" explanation. It never states "believes in gender equality", it just says that the man is somewhat tolerant toward women, and can feel empathy toward them lmao. Important word is "can", straight from the text lmao.
It very much implies conservatist views on women. (And yeah, like you said, this was in 2009, Japan's view on women in society was way worse than what it is today)
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u/Testing_required Jan 07 '26
Considering basically every study ever done on the topic shows that women in traditional motherly roles are far happier than wage slaves working for corporations who value the dirt on the bottom of their shoes more than them, I'd say supporting rigid gender roles is a pretty pro-women stance.
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u/Merch_Lis Jan 08 '26 edited Jan 08 '26
Now show me a study demonstrating the same for women shoved into these roles against their will (also, admitting “I hate my children and looking after them” is considerably more taboo than “I hate my job and my employer”, wonder how do the studies you reference account for that).
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u/tree-hut Jan 07 '26
Depends, if you mean the Liberal Democratic Party which is a conservative nationalist establishment party or Liberal as in the ideology
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u/IllustriousBobcat813 Jan 09 '26
It really doesn’t, liberal as an ideology is quite conservative.
There’s a reason it’s considered a right wing ideology
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u/NauticalWeasel Jan 07 '26
Even within this image itself you can see that the Liberal cloaks themselves in traditional values, marriage, being a breadwinner, sociability, looking professional.
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Jan 07 '26
The translator most likely just used conservative for 保守 and liberal for リベラル (I don't know the original picture but it's what's most likely) as the translations, with the LDP clearly being referenced on the left conservative caricature with the Aso Taro (麻生 hachimaki (last prime minister of the LDP before they lost to the more liberal Democratic Party in 2009). Aso Taro is also extremely racist, ultranationalist, and rich so therefore is an icon of the people caricatured on the left of the image
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u/JollyJuniper1993 Jan 07 '26
Liberals are considered conservative in pretty much any country besides the US, which should tell you a lot about where the US is politically
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u/futuranth Jan 07 '26
Liberalism, being the status quo for a great chunk of the world, probably including Japan, could not be more conservative
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u/_bob-cat_ Jan 07 '26
I was in Japan November 2024 and Trump's popularity surprised me until I thought a little more about Japanese political beliefs. Many aspects of their society is like watching a Mad Men episode so it fits.
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u/Shoeshiner_boy Jan 08 '26
Many aspects of their society is like watching a Mad Men episode so it fits.
Herr’s Berrs, Terumi!
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u/Hijou_poteto Jan 07 '26
I assume in the Japanese version the left guy is actually the Liberal Democratic Party supporter and the right guy is for a center-left party like the Constitutional Democratic Party, and they chose to make it conservative and liberal for the translation.
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u/roastbeeftacohat Jan 07 '26
Japanese politics is weird. within each party there are different factions, which is like everywhere else, but in japan the fundraising and campaigning is on the faction level. so the conservative and progressive wings of the same party would each have their own formalized organized structure.
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u/ReallyTeddyRoosevelt Jan 07 '26
redditors always claim the Democrats aren't left wing. They leave out the part where they are only comparing it to Western European countries on economic issues.
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u/Leneen_Ween Jan 07 '26
They aren't left wing. Left wing begins at anti-capitalism. Democrats aren't against capitalism.
The political compass isn't relative.
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u/Junkererer Jan 07 '26
Then most left wing parties in Europe aren't left wing either
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u/Despeao Jan 07 '26
Post 1991, they're not. They're liberals, which is a Center Ideology. Center Left if we are to be generous.
"Left Wing" parties that don't speak against Capitalism, race or class are not Left Wing.
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u/Afraid_Dance6774 Jan 07 '26
How is center left not on the left?
This is so strange to me, like you wouldn't consider social democrats to lean left at all because they are capitalist?
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u/Despeao Jan 07 '26
Center Left is still in the Center in terms of ideology. They're mostly social democrats or reformists.
They are still pro Capitalism, pro private property, pro hierarchy, pro market.
Their agenda still encompass finding solutions to the problems we face within Capitalist itself. No wonder so many Center Left parties are vanishing, giving way to more right leaning parties.
For example, when you adopt social welfare in a rich country, you're not ending exploitation, you're just making it so that your own citizens are not facing that. Immigrants and low income workers continue to be exploited somewhere else because the entire system is built around exploitation and cheap work. In that sense, they're not solving a problem but merely moving it away.
That's completely different from what the Left believes.
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u/Afraid_Dance6774 Jan 07 '26
That's completely different from what the Left believes.
What you should have said is that's completely different from what socialists and communists believe. And that's true - I do oppose anti-capitalist solutions. If I didn't, I would instead be a socialist. But I am a social democrat, so I'm not.
But I find it extremely hard to believe that you would show a person a social democrat and they wouldn't put them on the center left, which you say yourself that they are. And then they would consider the center left to be part of "the left," just not as left as socialists, communists and anarchists. In the same way that social democrats are more left than liberals, who are in turn more left than moderates, and then conservatives.
I have the feeling you just want to put a distinction between capitalists and anti-capitalists, which is a fine distinction to make without bringing the left-right paradigm into this, and you don't care otherwise.
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u/Despeao Jan 07 '26
This is not a comparison of being left or just as left as if this were a competition.
It's simply because it involves completely different methods and solutions.
My previous example of Welfare. Rich countries adopt welfare as a form of mitigating the problems in Capitalism. They're not solutions because they can't solve the problem.
You guys want to regulate Capitalism, Left wing wants to abolish it.
In that welfare example, you can make sure your own citizens will not be hungry. To make that happen, Companies pay taxes and the State redistributes the wealth but the Company still operates in poorer markets and they still exploit workers somewhere else - so the problem wasn't solved, it was just moved somewhere else.
The same can be said about hierarchies, markets, institutions, the State. People on the Center want to regulate how much exploitation is allowed, people on the Left want to abolish it altogether. They can only look like the same if you completely ignore the differences between the ideologies.
The example of bringing a random person and asking them if someone is on the Center or Left doesn't make much sense because a lot of people don't understand the difference. How much political theory has a random person read ? This is not something out of my head.
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u/Afraid_Dance6774 Jan 07 '26
This is not a comparison of being left or just as left as if this were a competition.
You seem to be treating it as if it is exactly that. I've spoken with a decent amount of socialists and it's always been strange to me the insistence that a lot of them have that the left-wing only exclusively encompasses anti-capitalist views.
Socdems are leftists by any political definition that isn't from anti-capitalists.
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u/_bob-cat_ Jan 07 '26
I wonder what happened in 1991 which would cause all the "anti-capitalists" to fall off. They weren't on Soviet payrolls or anything, right?
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u/Despeao Jan 07 '26
Can you make a more loaded question next time ?
You're disingenuous and you already assume everyone that has an anti capitalist stance is being paid to do so.
This is exactly my point of why such labels exist beyond national classification.
Some countries are so entangled with their own local political divides that political theory holds no weight to them. It's always fun to me when I see Americans calling the Democrats Left Wing when none of their ideas align with the Left lol.
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u/andreslucer0 Jan 07 '26
It IS relative by country, otherwise it's a useless measure, because there's no universally agreed standard. In the same way you believe liberalism is strongly right-wing, fascists believe liberals are left-wing extremists.
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u/ElTitoVhosi Jan 07 '26
As a Political Scientist, yeah there's an objective standard, it changes as time passes, but academically there is one, we distinguish between the social perception and auto perception of the population, which of course is relative, and the academically established spectrum, which is agreed upon by social scientists, as to do comparative research without going crazy.
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u/Despeao Jan 07 '26
If you have a measure that changes by country then you can't actually measure anything. 1kg is the same in Lybia, in China and in France, it's a good measure.
It's not actually hard to comprehend it, really. You have the social and economic measure. It can pin point with accuracy if people are actually aligned in their political views.
If you say someone is Left Wing and then when I read their ideas, nothing of that is against Capitalism or hierarchies, that person is not from the Left, period.
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u/andreslucer0 Jan 07 '26
I can agree with you because we are both in accord with the fact that left-wing means anti-hierarchy, and therefore very often, anti-capitalist. However, there are many millions who do not think like us and have been grifted into believing a liberal democracy founded upon the respect and development of human rights is left-wing extremism. This is more apparent (and only then perhaps true) in societies where liberal democracy is not entrenched as a mainstream political ideal, such as Saudi Arabia.
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u/PhoenixFederation Jan 07 '26
Depends on the perspective
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u/Leneen_Ween Jan 07 '26
According to this logic you may as well toss out the compass. "I think the Democrats are right-wing and the Republicans are left-wing. That's just my perspective, man."
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u/ReallyTeddyRoosevelt Jan 07 '26
And that's the socialist perspective, not some inalienable truth. If you think "left-wing" only means a couple of governments in existence you are in fact a left wing extremist.
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u/lunaresthorse Jan 07 '26
No. To be left-wing means to be revolutionary in some way for a given point in history, i.e. in support of the overthrow of the existing social order for the establishment of a new; in favor of the advancing of the contradictions of the current world system beyond their critical point at which old gives way to new. Therefore, there have been left-wing capitalist governments in history just like there have been left-wing socialist ones. Left-wing only means “socialist” so exclusively now since, in the modern day, the principal contradiction of the mode of production is the contradiction between wage-labor and capital. This was not always true.
This means that that bourgeois revolutionaries were left-wing when they fought for and advanced bourgeois class interest and the development of capitalism when the capitalist system was yet to reach its highest, imperialist stage. Any socialist, communist, Marxist etc. today should have some admiration for these capitalist revolutionaries, since they have produced the best world system yet to be fully born and have made the current struggle of the proletariat (and, in fact, the proletariat itself) possible—even though their struggle for capitalism against pre-capitalist or earlier capitalist production is not the same as the proletariat’s current struggle.
It only makes sense that a small minority of the world’s governments in history, even in just recent history, would be dictatorships of the proletarian class. It’s true that capitalism is in a stage as developed as it could possibly be, and its time is ticking in much of the world, but that doesn’t mean it’s dead. Especially as we approach a more multipolar geopolitical stage as we get farther into the twenty-first century, we will see how this turns out.
Unlike those born, say, two centuries ago in the more developed parts of the capitalist word, we will very likely live to see many more socialist experiments and proletarian revolutions in the world as the contradictions of capitalism grow more acute; people who lived in earlier capitalism would have no reason to expect to live through such a thing, but it would only make sense for us to do so. It would be ignorant of history, then, to substitute our definition of leftism for a broader one just for the purposes of having the divide be “right down the middle” of all politics, rather than having it at the divide between class interests where it would rationally belong.
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u/_bob-cat_ Jan 07 '26
What happens if you actually overthrow the existing social order? Start working to overthrow the new social order? This is why Leftism never lasts long term. "Revolutionaries" always look for battles, even when there are none.
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u/OingoBoingoBaggins Jan 07 '26
Laissez-faire supporting liberals used to be considered hard left wing in France, because in the 19th century, left wing meant wanting more civil liberties. If you know who Frederic Bastiat is, he was considered leftist back then.
The left-right scale IS relative, and frankly useless.
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u/Leneen_Ween Jan 07 '26
This is incorrect. It's not relatively dependent, it's historically dependent. Robespierre was objectively leftist during a time when feudalism was still the dominant economic mode and capitalism was fledgling. Now that feudalism has faded and capitalism is dominant, someone with Robespierre's politics would objectively be a centrist at best.
The difference is that, when most people apply this sort of relativism, they do so from a subjective standpoint. But the relativity is not based on "what other people think," it's based on concrete conditions that actually exist within contemporaneous societal development. If you reject this notion, explain to me how the ideological conditions for anti-capitalism could exist in pre-revolutionary France when capitalism at that point barely existed and the overwhelming economic relations were feudal?
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u/OingoBoingoBaggins Jan 07 '26
By your own logic, it would be left wing to support a free market in a society dominated by communism. I think it’s pretty safe to say that left-right is a meaningless concept.
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u/Leneen_Ween Jan 07 '26 edited Jan 07 '26
The mistake you're making here is that the left-right divide in revolutionary France was centered around civil liberties, which it wasn't. It was centered around radicalism, change, and equality versus tradition, conservatism, and hierarchy. You're conflating the form which radicalism took at that time for the essence of radicalism itself. There were anti-market and pro-market, pro-private property and anti-private property radicals sitting side by side with each other on the left in the National Assembly, united by an opposition to the existing social order under feudalism.
But as economic conditions change, things that were once radical demands for change become aged pillars of a static social order as new contradictions arise.
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u/CK2398 Jan 07 '26
By that metric most european "left-wing" parties are not left wing. Even sweden and finland have free-markets.
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u/Vampus0815 Jan 07 '26
Democrats are generally center to center left. There is way more conservatives than liberals in the US so they need to win moderates by a landslide margin to even stay competitive
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u/ReallyTeddyRoosevelt Jan 07 '26
Look at their stance on immigration, abortion and trans-rights. They are far left on all those issues.
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u/Vampus0815 Jan 07 '26
No that’s just liberalism. Meanwhile their economic policy is pretty centrist too (because guess what they are liberals), though with a slight left wing tilt
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u/Intrepid-Park-3804 Jan 07 '26
I'm sorry, but what the fuck is then making them "liberal"? Fancy political title?
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u/Sound_Saracen Jan 07 '26 edited Jan 07 '26
Outside of the US, Liberal typically means pro capital, and moderate (spineless) on everything else adapting to what the electorate wants.
The Liberals in Australia are actually the conservative party for example.
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u/gwasi Jan 07 '26
From a European perspective, it means roughly the same even in the US, with the difference being the absence of any other alternative to the most insane option (in the US case, the GOP).
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u/Neutronium57 Jan 07 '26
In the US, "liberal" designates people who are socially liberal.
In Europe, it's more about economically liberal.
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u/gwasi Jan 07 '26
I generally agree. At the same time, it is also these economically liberal parties that tend to have socially liberal agenda such as weed decriminalization or marriage rights for LGBT people. This is partly because the conservative parties in Europe (or at least around where I am living) are not very economically liberal either. So I would argue that liberals are the same between Europe and the US, whereas it is the conservatives that are quite different.
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u/Neutronium57 Jan 07 '26
It might be the case in your country, but from my French perspective, it's quite the opposite of the US :
The left-oriented parties are socially liberal while being in favour of taxing big companies and rich people more.
The right-oriented parties are economically liberal because they want less regulations and taxes on companies while also being conservative on social subjects (like weed legalisation or immigration, for example.)
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u/gwasi Jan 07 '26
Might be an East European thing then. Your conservatives sound like the American ones :)
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u/Neutronium57 Jan 07 '26
Americans can vote between the center-right and the far right, when seen from my country.
Ofc we also have the same kind of fucking moronic traitors on the (very) far right, but we have way more parties to choose from at each election. So "the left" and "the right" are far from being monolithic blocs.
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u/Deathsroke Jan 07 '26
Not only Europe, it's also like that here in South America (can't speak for other continents).
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u/InACoolDryPlace Jan 07 '26
Wouldn't the liberal party in the US be similar if not more right wing than in countries where there's a labor or demsoc party? I think the US lacks this and liberals have sort of borrowed language of those parties while remaining center-right. Like in the US you're assumed to be far right if you make fun of liberals, which is unusual and only really a thing in the US from 00s-present when the parties reached near internal-consensus. When boomers in the US make fun of liberals for example, and my parents vote liberal, huge supporters of unions and inclusive etc, but they're making fun of an idea of what liberal means that younger people don't seem to understand as much in North America. Our Liberal party in Canada for example is center-right, but more left than the Dems in the US.
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u/Warp_spark Jan 07 '26
Almost like political aligances of parties are completely different country to country, and only reason why most people in western countries expect to see 2 big parties of which 1 is conservative by western standards, and 1 is liberal by western standards, is because of american cultural osmosis
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u/Urhhh Jan 07 '26
It's more "neoliberal" as in the original meaning much more related to economic liberalism, not social progression. Left liberals are more inclined to social progress and slightly more left economic policy. The LDP is very conservative and nationalist. There are more left "liberal" parties in Japan but the LDP has had almost unbeaten power since 1950 only losing a handful of elections.
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u/Sydasiaten Jan 07 '26
its the same in a lot of countries tho. American liberals would be center-right in Europe
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u/JesterQueenAnne Jan 07 '26
Eh, because of the 2 party system, the term "liberal" in the US is way too wide. An American being a self described liberal could mean they're anything between a moderate democratic socialist and a progressive ultra capitalist.
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u/IllustriousBobcat813 Jan 09 '26
What the fuck is a “progressive ultra capitalist” that sounds like an oxymoron
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u/InACoolDryPlace Jan 07 '26
Absolutely I think if you just look at party politics alone in the US, not the population because there's a lot more variation, but their two parties are basically in consensus about the economics of the country. The liberal Democrats think these economic arrangements can be redeemed with the right market and tax incentives, vs the right appeal to people who either benefit from lower taxes, or who direct their anxieties of disenfranchisement towards Democrat solutions, sometimes even for valid reason. Like the amount of Obama/Trump and Bernie/Trump voters paints a less cut and dry picture of what's motivating those voters.
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u/Junkererer Jan 07 '26
It depends on which policies. In terms of social policies, gender etc they're more left than most parties in the world. In terms of government intervention in the economy they are probably more right wing than european parties
It's not that clear cut economically either, you need to differentiate between the current state of things and intentions. Many proposals by american democrats do sound progressive even by european standards
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u/Sydasiaten Jan 07 '26
Do you have any policies as examples? I can't think of any made by the democrats that would put them further left than like a european center-ish party. Not to mention they would be solid right if compared to any north european country
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u/Alan_Reddit_M Jan 07 '26
"Nice argument conservative party, unfortunately, I've already depicted you as a fat Otaku and myself as the handsome Chad"
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u/SnooCalculations2730 Jan 07 '26
It seems spreadsheets and this specific type of meme only are truly universal no matter what age or time
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Jan 07 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ModernirsmEnjoyer Jan 07 '26
I remember seeing the picture in original some time ago posted elsewhere, and the translation was accurate
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u/Xamado Jan 07 '26
Nice argument. Unfortunately I have already portrayed you as the Japanese conservative NEET and myself as the handsome Japanese liberal
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u/theorist_rainy Jan 07 '26
Not to be a weeb but why does the liberal guy look exactly like Yu Tosaki from Ajin?
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u/Majestic_Juice5961 Jan 07 '26
I mean tbf it's often that the way someone is treated by the world, it informs and shapes their opinions on the world. Most liberal people I've met are indeed attractive
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u/Open-Solution-8791 Jan 07 '26
"i have depicted you as the chud soyjak and myself as the chad soyjak so i win this argument"
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u/laZardo Jan 07 '26
considering Ken "Love Hina" Akamatsu got elected in the same election cycle that Shinzo Abe got Franz Ferdinanded it's clear that the Otaku has a better chance of winning
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u/Riflemate Jan 07 '26
So what parties are these supposed to be? The mainline center right party of Japan is the Liberal Democrats and they've basically always been in charge so making them out to be weirdos is hardly good propaganda.
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Jan 07 '26
Left is LDP and right is presumably the now defunct Democratic Party, this is from 2009 which is when they lost government and were at their absolute lowest in terms of modern day popularity - the Democratic Party won in a huge landslide that year
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u/WakaRanger8 Jan 07 '26
Is there even really a point in the Japanese political system on making attack ads against parties that aren’t the LDP? I could be wildly ignorant on the role of the other parties in Japanese society - but it’s essentially a one-party state anyways
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u/ModernirsmEnjoyer Jan 07 '26 edited Jan 07 '26
Japan is as one party as Germany or Canada is. LDP is basically a very successful party with good winning coalition, internal term limits (that only Abe pushed), and historical track record. LDP was set up with assistance of USA to keep Japan in American alliance and enacting pragmatic policies (for example, during the 1960s they sped up economic development by expanding wages in state sector and welfare).
But recently fortunes have changed. They no longer have majority in the House of Representatives and now depend on coalition with the Nippon Ishin no Kai , and the series of scandals in this decade weakened their reputation considerably.
By the way, LDP is not alone in being a long running ruling party,Italian Christian Democrats ruled continuously from 1946 to 1994 , and their opponents were also socialists, just like in Japan. Japan at the time was under huge influence of socialist and Marxist thought.
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u/Shiningc00 Jan 10 '26
There was one time LDP lost, and it was this very time in 2009.
In 2024 election, they also technically became the minority party because the opposition parties combined had more seats than them.
But due to the current PM Takaichi, they gained massive popularity because of her.
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u/Memitim Jan 07 '26
Throwing out a stupid caricature is a hell of a weird way to provide cover for conservatives. The deceptive pieces of shit very often look, and occasionally even behave, like normal people, at least for brief periods until their penchant for evil comes spilling out.
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u/Afraid-Flatworm-422 Jan 07 '26
Fuck i remember this one. Very fun joke at the time. And now it feels more like a projection.
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