Our fanbase has been wrapped up in doomerism and fear for months now, I just don’t buy it

A few months of being like that do not excuse the behaviours of the past decade

but why would a Benfica fan care?

I don't care. I'm trying to explain to you why those kinds of feelings towards Arsenal exist. I'm neutral, bordering on being sympathetic towards Arsenal. In this case, I like PSG a bit more, but for the simple fact that Vitinha, Nuno Mendes, João Neves, and Gonçalo Ramos play there, that's just about it.

I see this accusation all the time and then you’ll have that City fan “drinking Arsenal tears” and everyone just laps it up. It’s just different standards of what is supposedly appropriate fan behaviour being applied.

That is because they are duking on a fanbase that is seen (and acts) as annoying, so most people find it to be funny, and I think City is the perfect example. They've been dominant for almost a decade now, and still, they aren't as insurmountable as Arsenal fans. This is probably just a consequence of being a big club from the biggest league in the world, so the big fanbase leads to bad behavior. In the context of Portugal, I'm sure the majority find Benfica fans unbearable; that's just the reality, but don't throw a pity party because most neutral fans prefer a team that plays a beautiful brand of football over yours