It's like China is just that one country (aside from the Khmer Rouge) that every ML (aside from Dengists like us) agrees to hate on.
Fellow Traveler and leftypol uploaded videos criticizing them, the Shining Path hung up literal dogs to protest them, Maoists go all insane saying that it's some red fash social-imperialist nation because (insert nato propaganda here). And Hoxhaists claim that China was never socialist and that the only socialist nation ever was USSR before Khrushchev and almighty holy Albania.
What is it that makes China so controversial even among MLs? I get that it's not perfect and every AES state has their Ls, but jesus.
I think the reason social democrats and anarchists tend to "vaguely pay respects while completely underappreciating" Marx is because they don't read theory. They don't know why anything happens the way it does. The pandemic also started the point when I began actually reading, so that might also be what lead to my deeper and more nuanced understanding of China.