Corbyn and New Labour: The Final Face/Off

Towards the end of the film Face/Off the Nicholas Cage character, knowing that he’s about to die and so will have to surrender the face he’s stolen off the John Travolta character back to the John Travolta character, who will then be turned back into the John Travolta character, starts slicing up the face he’s wearing with a knife, so as to say, fuck you I’m destroying your face forever, fuckface (nb if you got through that sentence without having seen the film, I salute you). I suspect that with regard to the contest for the new Labour leader something similar is happening. Knowing that they are about to lose, those who have always cared much more about the New bit than the Labour bit of the party are tearing up its reputation as a legitimate democratic institution by openly purging as many ideologically suspect new supporters as possible (because, let’s face it, it is inconceivable that someone who has voted Green in the past could ever want the Labour Party to return to a basic set of social democratic principles). They are, as it were, cutting off the party’s nose in order to spite Corbyn’s face.