Par for the course.

I grew up in the South hearing all about the evil big government yankees destroying our culture and way of life (“an entire civilization, Gone With the Wind”), trying to force everybody to obey the central authority in Washington - nevermind how the states treated people, that’s their business, we don’t need big government coming in and “meddling in our affairs.” The labor conditions in the factories up north were pretty bad too, so “both sides.”

Take all those arguments, go to the other side of the world, and couch them in leftist terminology like “imperialism” and “colonialism,” and you’ve got liberals with Tibet. Can’t talk sense into them anymore than you can talk sense into a redneck whining about Lost Cause shit. Keep people in chains and call anyone who tries to break those chains an authoritarian, as if the “rights” of states to oppress people matter more than rights of people to be free. It’s literally the exact same playbook.

“Tankie” is just how “big government liberal” translates to a different demographic.