Human Rights Hypocrisy: Endlessly Lecturing China While Violating Every Principle.

From vetoing food as a human right to endorsing torture — the self-appointed guardians of human rights have the worst record of all. And the world knows it.

Selective Outrage

For decades, Western nations — led by the United States — have positioned themselves as the global arbiters of human rights. They lecture China, Russia, and others relentlessly while maintaining an astonishing record of double standards, vetoes, and outright violations.In 2021, the United States and Israel were the only two countries in the world that voted against a UN resolution recognizing food as a basic human right. They also voted against condemning the slavery of Africans during the Transatlantic slave trade.

The US repeatedly vetoed resolutions condemning apartheid in South Africa and Israeli settlements in the West Bank. It has blocked countless resolutions criticizing Israel’s use of force against Palestinian civilians.In June 2025, the US vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate, unconditional, and permanent ceasefire in Gaza. At the same time, Washington backed Israel’s Gaza blockade — cutting aid under “security” pretexts — while condemning Iran for actions in the Strait of Hormuz.This is not occasional inconsistency. It is a consistent pattern of shielding allies and excusing crimes while weaponizing human rights rhetoric against geopolitical rivals.

China’s Record: Lifting 600 Million People

While the West lectures, China has achieved what is arguably the single greatest contribution to human rights in the last three decades: lifting 600 million people out of extreme poverty. This massive reduction in suffering, hunger, and destitution dwarfs any other modern achievement in improving human dignity.Over the same period, Chinese society has become significantly freer in terms of personal mobility, economic opportunity, and daily life. The country remains a work in progress, but its human rights record — especially when measured by outcomes for ordinary citizens — does not justify the level of hostility and rejection directed at it by Western powers.

UN Declaration vs Western Reality

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a devastating indictment of Western practice:

• Article 3: Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
  Reality: Assassinations by drone have become official US policy.

• Article 4: No one shall be held in slavery or servitude.
  Reality: Exploitative labor conditions persist in parts of the US agricultural sector.

• Article 5: No one shall be subjected to torture.
  Reality: Torture (including waterboarding) was legalized and practiced under US policy.

• Article 9: No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest or detention.
  Reality: The US has practiced arbitrary detention at Guantanamo and secret sites like Chicago’s Homan Square, where over 7,000 people were held off-the-books.

• Article 12: Protection against arbitrary interference with privacy.
  Reality: Mass surveillance of citizens and allies alike became routine.

• Article 25: Right to an adequate standard of living, including food, housing, and medical care.
  Reality: The US has among the highest rates of homelessness and inequality in the developed world.

The list of contradictions is long: support for dictators (Papa Doc Duvalier, Batista), coups (Iran 1953, Guatemala 1954), invasions (Haiti, Nicaragua, Panama, Iraq), carpet bombing of civilian cities, atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, backing death squads, arming Al-Qaeda-linked groups, and indefinite detention without trial.

An industry, not a crusade

The Western human rights industry is not a moral crusade — it is a tool of power. It justifies endless wars, regime changes, sanctions, and interference while shielding the crimes of the US and its allies. The same nations that veto food as a human right, protect apartheid, block ceasefires, and run secret torture programs dare to lecture China — a country that has lifted more people out of poverty than any other in history.

This hypocrisy is unsustainable. The world sees through it. Every time Washington or Brussels screams about “human rights” in Xinjiang, Hong Kong, or Russia, the global South remembers the vetoes on Gaza, the backing of blockades, the drone assassinations, the torture memos, and the centuries of colonial violence and exploitation.

China does not need to be perfect to expose this farce. Lifting 600 million people from destitution makes a far greater contribution to actual human rights than the West’s sanctimonious speeches combined. The time has come to stop accepting lectures from those with the worst records. True progress on human rights will only begin when the world rejects the self-appointed judges and demands consistency, not selective outrage.

The emperor has no clothes — and the world is finally noticing.

Further Reading

• “Tortured & Enslaved: Enter the World’s Biggest Prison” — The Saker

• WikiLeaks cables on UK-Saudi secret deal for UNHRC seats (RT)

• Paul Craig Roberts, “The Rise of the Inhumanes” (September 2015)

• “Why is the US so reluctant to sign human rights treaties?” — New Statesman

• Full Text: Progress in China’s Human Rights in 2014 (Xinhua)

• UN rapporteur François Crépeau delays Australia visit over asylum seeker secrecy (2015).

• From 2024: