People like to yell at me that the center-left are not my enemy and yeah, mostly, probably, but that doesn't necessarily make them useful allies either and there's a lot of wolves in sheep's clothing.

I have colorful things to say about everyone in the political spectrum. I'm not singling you out and it just starts to smack of "hit dogs holler" after a point.

@gwynnion They may not be my enemy right now. But the first time you actually ask them for help in a way that hurts their feelings, they'll kick you RIGHT under the fash's bus...

@JessTheUnstill Yeah, one of my biggest criticisms about these people is they SAY they're good, enlightened liberal allies and then turn into NIMBYs or bigots or ghost you as soon as you need them to help someone else.

A lot of self-proclaimed liberals aren't, basically.

@gwynnion @JessTheUnstill

Right now, an awful lot of their liberal values seem to be honoured mostly in "I'm sorry, I normally try to do X, but..." qualifiers.

@passenger @JessTheUnstill "Oh, gosh, I'd love to help you but it would be politically divisive and cost us votes with the people who want you dead. Sorry!"

@gwynnion @passenger @JessTheUnstill Every time I've run from a cop in riot gear, it was a Democratic mayor who authorized the cops to assault the demonstrators.

@foolishowl @passenger @JessTheUnstill Yeah, that's another point that frequently fails to land with these people. In a lot of places, it is Democrats who are the problem, especially at the mayoral level where they're in deep with cops.

The call is often coming from inside the house.

@foolishowl @passenger @JessTheUnstill Like, the mayor of Dallas just switched to Republican because it's better for his state level political prospects, and he was already a pro-cop, big business conservative Democrat.

@gwynnion @foolishowl @JessTheUnstill

I wonder what Eric Adams thought of that.

@passenger @foolishowl @JessTheUnstill I have to be reminded he's not Rudy Giuliani in disguise.

@passenger @foolishowl @JessTheUnstill People like to hide behind "big tent politics" but it inevitably devolves to doing nothing that upsets white conservatives or has less than universal support.

And of course, white conservatives will oppose universally popular policy out of spite anyway.

@gwynnion @foolishowl @JessTheUnstill

Yeah, this. It basically amounts to laundering conservative (or fascist) policies, often under the excuse that "if you don't support us doing some fascism, you'll get them doing a lot of fascism."

@passenger @foolishowl @JessTheUnstill Essentially, and if you criticize it, you get treated as one of the fascists yourself even though that doesn't make any sense and even though Democrats regularly remind us the fascists are their friends. 🤔

But ordinary Democratic voters online put a lot of work into cognitive dissonance so as not to think about this.