Fun with metaphors! I fall into them so easily myself, there’s no reason my characters couldn’t be able to do them.
Here we have the usual Sin of the Nice People — like the Not Nice People we operate on projection: believing the other guy is just like us. We’re not naive; we simply think that just because we wouldn’t lie, abuse, destroy, torture or despise, nobody else would do it either. Rommel couldn’t lie, and Hitler walked all over him.
On the other hand, we automatically suppose that the Not Nice People must view themselves the same as we view them. An old episode of Law and Order displayed what was supposed to be a Waffen-SS identify card with a photo of a scowling officer. Of course, nobody scowled in those pictures; the nastiest war-criminals look open and sweet-faced because it was the fashion to look at the camera with open eyes and guileless expression. We all think we’re the Good Guys.
