there's a more complicated point here that's tricky to articulate, but i do think this ultimately comes down to anti-imperialism. one way or another, it's always the wedge that destroys any western left, and your attitude towards it eventually ends up dictating your trajectory https://twitter.com/mrmcjoc/status/1334493006439833601

there's a lot of ways in which McDonnell is and was more radical & more serious a Marxist than Corbyn, but he's not had the same atttiude & commitment to anti-imperialism, and i'm convinced that's more important than anything in understanding their different trajectories

it's often very indirect - from empire to palestine to antisemitism, or from empire to migration to brexit, or from empire to NATO to the EU - but it always seems to turn up at the root of our most fraught divisions

this is also why none of you should have ever been surprised by what happened to Paul Mason. and fwiw my instinct is that it's likely a big part of the reason that despite being a self-confessed social democrat, someone like @michaeljswalker hasn't fallen down the same hole

hopefully someone like @Tom_Gann can give a fuller theoretical explanation than i can of how & why this happens exactly, but it's definitely part of what's underlying this stuff