> 2) Stop US violations of human rights (gitmo)
It's not an appropriate comparison.
No, that is exactly the very definition of a whataboutism!
Many Chinese feel like they always need the high ground, and if their criticiser is not "perfect", whatever they say is null and void. This is just nuts, because no one is perfect.
When the US preaches about human rights it devalues the concept. That makes it harder to hold countries like China to account.
And anyways, how do US torture camps compare to Chinese torture camps? Its not like China is a paragon of virtue here, torture by the police is a huge problem that even the gov admits to (hey, police shouldn't torture people, please don't, it makes us look bad).
> When the US preaches about human rights it devalues the concept.
And who is the "US"? It is like some unified person that speaks with one voice? Is the NyTimes the US? Is the BBC the US? When I speak out on China, am I the US?
> That makes it harder to hold countries like China to account.
That is a straw man. We can't hold China to account for their human rights behavior, we have no right to do that. But we can damn be sure that everyone knows about it. I would expect the same for other countries with respect to the US.
> how do US torture camps compare to Chinese torture camps?
Bringing the conversation there is super weird. A torture camp is not a normal thing for a civilized country to have.
The US government failed to dismantle it for 8 years when it had a democratic mandate to do that. Now, with a president elected after proclaiming torture a fine thing, when a western country tells a dictator to stop human rights abuse, they can just shut the conversation with "tell your American friend to stop it first".
Anyways, this whataboutism-ing is idiotic. If you want to talk about the USA whenever we are talking about china fine, but why don't you start a separate article submission.
The terms mean different things. "Whataboutism" is the calling-out of hypocrisy, not hypocrisy itself.
"Actually, the principle that I think we ought to follow is the principle we rightly expected Soviet dissidents to follow. So what principle did we expect Sakharov [a Soviet scientist punished for his criticism of the U.S.S.R.] to follow? Why did people here decide that Sakharov was a moral person? I think he was. Sakharov did not treat every atrocity as identical-he had nothing to say about American atrocities. When he was asked about them, he said, "I don't know anything about them, I don't care about them, what I talk about are Soviet atrocities." And that was right-because those were the ones that he was responsible for, and that he might have been able to influence. Again, it's a very simple ethical point: you are responsible for the predictable consequences of your actions, you're not responsible for the predictable consequences of somebody else's actions."
AKA my country, right or wrong.
AKA, refusal to accept that value judgements are relative, not god given absolutes.
AKA, priority (let's focus on X and only X now) without actually prioritizing (let's compare to see if X is actually the major offender we should be focusing on)
But even more so, who said the 1.3 billion people in China are "victims" needing our compassion? Have you asked them whether they like their government and how their country is going?
And don't just ask some group back in the 90s in Tiananmen square -- because we could always ask the Kent State students in 1970, the blacks in Selma, the OWS, the Tea Party, the ones protesting against Bush/Obama/Trump etc and get a picture that wouldn't necessarily be what most of American's feel too.
There surely are human right abuses in China.
But it's the Chinese (the people, not the government) that should define what they are, through their own values and preferences, not some finger pointing foreigners. Especially from countries with a large history of plundering, which also involves China (opium wars, etc) and most of the Pacific.
From the article
"We'd arranged to meet a woman in her village in China's central Hunan Province and to then travel with her by train to Beijing, filming as we went. But we never did get to meet our interviewee. The story we ended up with, however, reveals more about the exercise of power in China than any interview ever could. It is one that involves violence, intimidation and a forced confession - my first in my long reporting experience in China - in which I found myself apologising for "behaviour causing a bad impact" and for trying to conduct an "illegal interview"."
So, yes, this exact story is about asking Chinese people about their government and having their equipment smashed and being forced to sign confessions for their efforts.
It should certainly be for the Chinese to define these things, the fact they can't is rather the point.
I highly recommend a short essay by the anthropologist Lila Abu-Lughod titled "Do Muslim Women Need Saving?" that touches on parts of this question: http://ideas.time.com/2013/11/01/do-muslim-women-need-saving....
> We were surprised when many women in Afghanistan didn’t take them off after being “liberated,” seeing as they had become such symbols of oppression in the West. But we were confusing veiling with a lack of agency.
Agency doesn't mean "the will of the majority", it means individual ability. The Taliban imposing veiling removed agency. Now it's given back. Even if no more than a single woman in Afghanistan willingly removed the veil, it's still a good thing. If 10 years from now 100% of the women there decide they don't want to wear it anymore, they'll (hopefully) be able. Not under the Taliban.
> many women saw it as a liberating invention because it enabled them to move out of segregated living spaces while still observing the requirements of separating and protecting women from unrelated men.
I see how it can be liberating in that way for a woman whose religious beliefs make separation and protection a moral mandate. The difference, of course, is that religious beliefs shouldn't be imposed, and the Taliban did impose them.
> If we think that U.S. women live in a world of choice regarding clothing, we need to look no further than our own codes of dress and the often constricting tyrannies of fashion.
This is the most ridiculous argument. Of the many many women of the free countries that purposely dress against the norm, none are sent to jail, stoned to death, or whatever.
Is the whole essay like this?
> I see how it can be liberating in that way for a woman whose religious beliefs make separation and protection a moral mandate.
Huh? I think you're mixing up religious beliefs with social ones. This mandate is not unique to Islam and can be found all over the world in societies of varying development and even Christian ones. In fact, you should look at pictures of pre-revolution Iran [0] as proof that Islam itself is not incompatible with women mingling with men or not being veiled.
> This is the most ridiculous argument. Of the many many women of the free countries that purposely dress against the norm, none are sent to jail, stoned to death, or whatever.
Oh really? Men have been beat for wearing drag or for dressing effeminately. (or if you care specifically about women, see: transgender women) Gang members kill people over the color of their shirt or shoes. It's still illegal in most states for women to go topless. Just because you're not forced to wear a veil, doesn't mean you aren't oppressed by society's fashion.
> Is the whole essay like this?
It's not really a long essay, see for yourself.
[0]: http://www.businessinsider.com/iran-before-the-revolution-in...
> proof that Islam itself is not incompatible with women mingling with men or not being veiled
There are many branches of Islam, the same as there are many branches of Christianity.
In any case, my point was just that I can see how it's liberating for someone who would have personally chosen separation anyway. The Taliban imposed it. The author's argument that "many women saw it as a liberating invention" is like saying "many African slaves did live happy lives in the US south, and remained with their masters after liberation". Even if it's factually true, it's dishonest. If the veil's so good, let each woman choose.
> Men have been beat for wearing drag or for dressing effeminately. (or if you care specifically about women, see: transgender women) Gang members kill people over the color of their shirt or shoes.
You know that has nothing to do with fashion, which is what the author talks about. And you know those things are illegal, as opposed to mandated by law. So I don't think you're being frank in this conversation, rather just arguing for the sake of it.
> we need to look no further than our own codes of dress and the often constricting tyrannies of fashion.
Codes of dress, and tyrannies of fashion.
As I said, this is the most ridiculous argument. Of the many many women of the free countries that purposely dress against the norm, none are sent to jail, stoned to death, or whatever.
> you make disingenuous statements like "mandated by law"
Maybe I'm misinformed. I honestly believe the Taliban government imposed that all women had to wear a veil. Is that not the case?
US human rights violations surely do not all take place within the confines of Guantanamo Bay, nor are all of China's 1.3 billion people subject to mistreatment.
Even in China, the dispensation of justice is relative, which is what the article is about. I suppose you're OK with that too. Next you'll be telling us nobody can accuse the Chinese judicial system of corruption because the Americans are lynching Negroes.
in other words, only the infallible may criticize anyone/thing? that seems counterproductive.
If my hair is messed up and i tell a stranger that their hair is messed up, does that make me wrong? should they ignore what i said because /my/ hair is messed up?
No, it's simpler than that. Not all sins are equal.
You aren't going to push debate forward with this.
BBC, The Economist or Edward Lucas are not Americans either.
No one is perfect, if perfection is necessary to criticise or even just report news, then nothing will be criticised or reported.
Invocation of whataboutism is a mind bug and a lazy excuse to be one-sided that has to die.
And it's not just a "let's focus on X FOR NOW" issue (which would still be wrong, as issues should be judged relatively to gauge their importance).
It's mainly invoked by people who never bother to point fingers on the non-X sides, so the "let's focus on X FOR NOW" is more like "let's focus on X permanently".
The hypothetical interaction that would go "US: Hey China, we worry about your policy X. China: Hey US, we sort of understand where you're coming from, given your history. We also see similar issue with some of your policies..." would be perfectly fine.