alito's neighbors seem nice enuf (two tweet threads; wine, cheese, bathroom, fire pit, key lime pie?

[orleans]

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

[Sympthsical]

1. I honestly wonder if people realize what this looks like

"We are prepared to fight injustice hard!"

"What are you doing? General strike? Boycotts? Massive voter registration drives? Establishing grassroots networks to turn out the base in November?"

"We're having a garden party!"

I almost never say this, because I hate injecting race unnecessarily into anything and everything but . . .

This is one of the whitest white people things I have ever seen. The sheer amount of white affluent privilege just tossed out here for Twitter's edification.

Poor women, particularly of color, are about to go through some shit . . . but nah. Garden party!

It's like a protest, but just delightful!

Am I the only person side-eyeing just how absolutely tone deaf this is?

[Phoenix61]

2. Yes, you are. He lives in a very affluent

neighborhood. So do his neighbors. Would you be less offended if they passed out chips and soda?

[Raine]

3. "Damned if you do & damned if you don't" the neighbors would be condemned if they screamed and

turned a hose etc on the protesters, then they get condemned for giving them food ... seems there's no way to satisfy.

[betsuni]

4. +1

[Xavier Breath]

13. These people are choosing to provide aid and comfort to the protesters

being a pain in the ass to Alito. Rather than questioning their methods or optics, I'll just say more power to 'em.

[Hekate]

5. Sorry, it's just you. What exactly do you think would *not* be tone deaf in an upscale neighborhood?

Back when there were nationwide Black Lives Matter protests, a husband and wife pulled out their firearms when the protestors marched peacefully thru their wealthy neighborhood (it was some kind of shortcut, and it was a public byway). And we DUers were unanimous in our condemnation of that overtly hostile act.

Would you be more comfortable if Alito’s neighbors decided to rally around the bastard and stand at either end of the street toting guns? Would that make the statement you want to see?

Instead, the neighborhood made a statement about Supreme Court Justice Alito and his draft decision by making the protestors welcome. Very welcome. They didn’t show class solidarity with Alito — they showed solidarity with the protestors.

[betsuni]

6. +1

[Sympthsical]

7. Pretending the law will vaguely affect them is asking too much apparently.

I know where I am and the kind of response I'd get. So it's fine.

But when your "protest" is really just an excuse to hang out and snack.

I'm not even sure I'd describe this as bare minimum.

I'm amused. It just encapsulates the problem so well.

[Hekate]

8. What are they "pretending"? Please be explicit about how you read the minds of the neighbors...

…so you know what they are “pretending,” or what it is that you think you want them to pretend, because I can’t read your mind.

“Bare minimum” of what?

Did you want the neighbors burn his house to the ground? Hide in their houses? Refuse to offer human comforts, taking their cue from new Red state laws that make it illegal to hand out water and pizza to voters, or even let someone hold their place in line for a potty break?

I see that you are angry and resentful — of the (presumably) white neighbors in a (presumably) white neighborhood that is (most definitely, given Alito’s presence) upscale. And you are deeply angry — at them. The neighbors who are making it as clear as they can that they can’t stand him.

Apparently you can go it alone, but the rest of us need allies. I’ll take allies in this war where I can get them.

[Sympthsical]

9. When your protest looks like my weekend in Napa

Maybe the urgency of the situation is not translating in the way desired.

I am done with performative protest. That's all we have to offer much of the time. Here we are, on the knife's edge, where women are about to be pushed back decades.

Garden party, people.

I'm tired of the performative constantly being praised as if it is "doing something."

I'm a white guy who lives in an upscale neighborhood. If your protest looks like what I do in my yard on days off, one probably shouldn't praise the activism of it all.

[11 Bravo]

11. Or maybe your perception is screwed up.

But rest easy, short of hiring a skywriter, your bona fides as a super righteous lefty dude have been established as firmly as possible.

[BlackSkimmer]

15. Dayum. Thank you for saying it so much better than I.

[Kingofalldems]

12. Do you have specific evidence they are pretending?

[BlackSkimmer]

10. And let's not forget the BLM protester invited to a table by a white couple during a protest.

Who then downed their beer and smashed the glass on the ground.

People remember this kind of thing.

I’m with the wine and cheese group. Smh.

[BlackSkimmer]

16. + 1

[BlackSkimmer]

14. I wonder what would happen if someone posted "this is one of the blackest black people things"?

You actually wrote that. What did they do wrong?

Sorry, I usually agree with you, but making fun of people trying to keep things civilized makes no sense to me.