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Anonymous
>>629051 Article 175 of the Japan's Penal Code is essentially the "censorship law", and it is indeed old - from 1907, although parts are inherited from an 1880s law, and this did was indeed during the Meiji period.
Interestingly enough, one could blame the influence of the west in forming these laws (the Meiji era saw a nation-wide modernization and rebuilding effort), but the current Japanese constitution's was heavily influenced by American occupation forces, and guaranteed fairly liberal policies, such as women's right to vote, and freedom of speech. Ironically, it's Article 21 of the constitution (freedom of speech) that Japanese typically use to contest the censorship laws, although these attempts have obviously failed thus far.
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