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Human rights are not US-normsIn the main, they are not. But they are general platitudes, whose interpretation is left to the individual countries, and is subject to the power relations between them.
A country, then, might be seen accusing or even bombing another (supposedly) in defense of those rights, when itself doesn't follow them.
>There is nothing special with Chinese people that makes dictatorship good for them while it's bad for us.
If only it was so simple. First, there are different concepts of what's OK and what's not. A crude example: US people don't like kings. English people are OK with their (but they don't have much power there). Thailand people love them.
Then, there's selective judgement. E.g. the US can have the largest prison population (25% of the world for 5% of it's population), and the most death sentences, mass surveillance programs, arbitrary cop killings, or even torture camps off-site, but it's OK because it has "free elections" (where two parties alternate in power for 50+ years and vote for more of the same -- never mind gerrymandering). Whereas another country is portrayed as some nightmare regime for not having elections, whereas life there might be better in those other terms. Sure, there are people that complaint for all of the above, but they still happen (and have happened for decades), and few judge the government/country in whole for that or say that it must be overthrown/invaded whatever (whereas for other countries, they do).
There's also selective enforcement, e.g. in how Saudi Arabia can be a worse regime for its citizens in all of those aspects, but as an ally it's not scolded for that, nor does it face sanctions/retribution that non-favorable (i.e. competing) countries that face.
Then there's people who have no idea of world history, little understanding of diplomacy, and how fragile states can be, and what local antagonisms and powers are held back even by some "bad" at first analysis regime, that play god, intervene (to bring "democracy") and, even assuming they do that in earnest, they end up causing civil war and chaos (see Libya, Iraq, and so on). So while "There is nothing special with Chinese people that makes dictatorship good for them while it's bad for us", there could very well something special with China as a country, and it's constitution of people's, history, antagonisms, etc, that a change would unleash hell.