>It's a widely-used idiom with no severe connotations, outside of some social media politics bubbles. AFAICT, it's completely normal and tolerated language, including within mainstream US-left politics—the other comments are just wrong about this.

"mainstream us-left politics" does not represent the left, it represents the mainstream.

https://www.businessinsider.com/how-thin-blue-line-became-co...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thin_blue_line#Appearances_and...

https://www.moabtimes.com/articles/thin-blue-line-flag-is-a-...

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/06/09/the-short-...

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/police-chief-bans-thin-...

- "mainstream us-left politics" does not represent the left, it represents the mainstream"

I'm not following you; the context is someone is trying to get someone *fired from their job* for using this language.

I don't see it. A lapsed maintainer's description of how, in their own perspective, an adversarial rallying cry is less than compatible with a prominent position in a collaborative setting… may be many things, justified or not.

But a credible threat it isn't. You know this, I know this, and every reader of this message knows this, too.

You're claiming that the American left has no issue with the term "thin blue line" or its context because that term is accepted by the mainstream. I provided links to demonstrate the contrary, illustrative of the fact that the American left does in fact have an issue with the term and its context, and that the mainstream of American politics and media does not represent the actual culture of American leftism.

Also the Noveau kernel is as far as I understand a FOSS project. There are no "jobs" from which one can be "fired."

So some fragile far-left activists have a grievance of the day with language that is benign for the majority of the population. So what? No one should care and the adults can continue about their day.

Across the Atlantic, for people of a certain age at least, it evokes memories of Rowan Atkinson's classic comedy series "The Thin Blue Line" about inept British police officers.

Across the Atlantic, the police won't shoot you in the head for walking while black.

At least the first quote is political and essentially casts the "other side" as an enemy rather than merely an opponent. This is not uncommon to use this strategy in political speech, and it is done rather well (and probably deliberately) here, but it is not an innocuous turn of phrase.

The second quote at least refers to a time when police had to play a defensive role against, once again, an enemy. This whole paragraph gives a clear vision of police having a military role (eg "fallen officers").

I didn't know that expression before, but the examples I see, (and its origin as an analogy to the thin red line) give it a connotation that is not neutral. The thin blue line is a metaphorical line between the maintainers of a certain order and a common enemy.

Using this expression in the context of kernel maintenance is at least somewhat clumsy.

Thanks for illustrating how insane these people are.