The problem with that is: I haven't said China is a shitty place or a wasteland. I happen to like China, and I happen to love America and live there. It's absolutely in no way about saying China is worse or better, it's about pointing out the ignorance in claiming China is a vastly superior place to live.
I'm willing to be objective about America and China's faults. The problem with the person I'm arguing with, is that that person is not willing to be objective about China's faults, and is more than willing to be biased about America's faults.
In my observation, most first world countries have the same societal problems that America does (or some modest variation), the big difference is whether they're publicized heavily or not. For example, America gets accused of being a highly racist nation: well, how racist is Japan? How about African racism? How about antisemitism in France? How about the Muslim ghettos in France? How about the extreme xenophobia in many nice European nations? Nobody likes to talk about that, and Americans are mostly ignorant of it, but it's all over the BBC's news reports regularly.