“Before one studies Zen, mountains are mountains and waters are waters; after a first glimpse into the truth of Zen, mountains are no longer mountains and waters are no longer waters; after enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and waters once again waters.”
There seems to be two camps of people in the comments here. One camp is saying more or less what you say, and the other camp is people who have had it happen to them personally and don't wish to expose themselves to the possibility of the downside risk again knowing how sucky it can be.
Source: I've experienced a situation where I gave honest feedback and nothing bad happened, and I've experience a situation where I gave honest feedback and it impacted a subsequent employment opportunity.
I gave one doozy of an answer once in an anonymous feedback survey. I then started to feel quite bad about it and realized probably it's not so hard to figure out who that feedback possibly came from. I went to my skip level boss and leveled with him about the feedback I had given. He was remarkably cool about it and told me they didn't get enough responses to that particular question to pass some threshold and hence he hadn't even seen that response. Luckily he wasn't a psychopath type manager and was generally just a wise old guy who was a great politician and I didn't wind up burning a bridge. But I definitely learned never to give honest feedback under the guise of anonymity.
I have shared direct, honest feedback to my skip level boss before, during and after the course of somewhat disastrously run projects. I've kept in regular contact with my old team since leaving and thanks to my feedback the company has completely turned around... NOT! Still the same old, same old patterns playing out day after day. Learned my lesson on that one. It's just not worth it.
I think you've reached enlightenment.