Let's be clear here: "conservative" politics don't mean bad, but I'm pretty aware I'm a leftist and a good chunk of my followers are. That's why I think people saw that post as me saying conservatism is bad. It's not. I'm just saying, art is always the power of the status quo. It reaffirms it. Hence, Orwell saying all art is propaganda. Note that Marx has very little to say about art as a leftwing idea. Barthes tried to find a way -- he called a possible political art as a "writing degree zero" -- but found it impossible to avoid literature that is effectively not status quo. There are now some theories about how art can liberate, but I remain skeptical if they are able to.

To me, any work with conservative elements is any work that in the end upholds the status quo. You can find a million examples of any work that has this. In the case of ARIA, it's about finding a balance where tourism -- an often exploitative and commodifying industry -- can find its place in the local economy. It's also about characters being free except they have to strangely return to heteronormative societies. Akari's characterization IS very strange in Origination when you realize she isn't that romantically interested in anyone, but the writing makes her she has to be with that guy. I don't mind it as much as other people, but it's there.

Kino no Tabi on the other hand actually features far-right ideas. It sure loves guns and putting down free speech... If you read Kino as a villain, uh........ The morals of each chapters are UHHHHHHHHHHH....... It's pretty hard to not think the book as some far-right book; it's a common and very justified complaint in the light novel subculture. Kino is extremely uncomfortable to read as a result.

The writer actually tweeted some fucked up shit if you know Japanese. A 2012 tweet (https://twitter.com/sigsawa/status/236041523903471616) for example. He got a lot of flak for defending Abe. Man, there's just a lot. Let's just say he is the most well-known light novel writer who flagrantly espouses racist shit.

Anyway, I shouldn't have grouped Aria and Kino together. The latter is actually way worse.