Slashdot Mirror

the Party was invincible. It would always exist, and it would always be the same. You could only rebel against it by secret disobedience or, at most, by isolated acts of violence such as killing somebody or blowing something up.
1984, Chapter 5

In pursuit of this vision, AI's mission is to undertake research and action focused on preventing and ending grave abuses of the rights to physical and mental integrity, freedom of conscience and expression, and freedom from discrimination, within the context of its work to promote all human rights.

For the record, the United Arab Emirates, the country that Abu Dhabi is the capital of, does not do beheadings. They have capital punishment, just like America, & they use a firing squad. So far this year they have not had a single execution, unlike the US. (Source: http://www.amnesty.org/resources/report04/stats-en g/text/06b.html )

Sorry to feed a troll, but I had to do this.

I vote using the Langer method; it's legal, but he was locked up for advocating it.

[1] Greens
[2] Labor
[2] Liberal

(or 2 for another minor party and 3 for both majors, or whatever). They have to throw your vote away when they get to the tied section.

Hello,

Amnesty International takes a somewhat dim view of this Sheriff's methods, and note that there was at least one suspicious death in custody among other things.

You're off by at LEAST a factor of 10. The USA kills at more than 60 of its own people EVERY YEAR in the name of freedom. It's the fourth most prolific executor after such venerable countries as IRAN, CHINA and SAUDI ARABIA! What a great and proud list of countries to be part of.

From Amnesty International: "In 2002, 69 men and two women were executed, bringing to 820 the total number of prisoners put to death since the US Supreme Court lifted a moratorium on executions in 1976. The USA continued to violate international standards in its use of the death penalty, including by executing people who were under 18 at the time of the crime and people who had received inadequate legal representation. On 20 June 2002, the US Supreme Court ruled that the execution of people with mental retardation violates the constitutional ban on "cruel and unusual punishments". The Court acknowledged that "within the world community" such executions were "overwhelmingly disapproved"."

Of course this is very different from Guantanamo Bay...

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAMR5104520 03

However, what is the probability of real mail getting rejected by these things.

In my case, with about 30000 messages processed since SA 2.62 was released, that number would be 3 messages. Two of which was from Amnesty International (join!), and was blocked because they are actually using spamware for their mailings, for some mysterious reason. The other was from a friend who got some really bad spammer worm, and consequently got on every block list there is.

These were however not blocked, they just landed among the other spam I let through to a spam folder. I do examine the SA summary of rejected spams occasionally, never seen anything there, and given these numbers, it seems just extremely unlikely that SA will reject any legit mail falsely in my current configuration. One in a million, perhaps...

amnesty int'l summary for 2003:

"The independence of the judiciary and the authority of the courts were seriously undermined by government officials and police in a number of cases. The security forces continued to enforce long-standing restrictions on freedom of assembly and association. Journalists were ill-treated and harassed when reporting on gatherings viewed by the authorities as political. Women were denied access to social and economic rights through discriminatory laws and practices. Asylum-seekers, including children, were detained in harsh conditions."

These are the conditions that were evoked to gain support for the overthrow of the Taliban.

But hey, United States got the biggest attention in Amnesty International Report 2004, and US produces more than half of the world's spam. You are correct, people seem to focus on irrelevant things. But compared to US, China is not the biggest to blame after all.

[Queue comments about China's human rights record from flag wavers]

I believe Amnesty International just gave the US a damning report on human rights abuses. Detention without charge or trial

It is hardly suprising that those in the US (land of the free etc) point the finger at China's human rights record, whilst ignoring human rights abuses in their own back yard (Guantanamo Bay, Iraqi prisoners, etc). I'd say our hypocracy (do as we say, but not as we do) and our naive view of the world ("good" vs "evil") has given us a lot of rope with which to hang ourselves.

Flag waving is not a sport

'Amnesty believes Microsoft is in violation of a new United Nations Human Rights code for multinationals which says businesses should 'seek to ensure that the goods and services they provide will not be used to abuse human rights'. The article basically states that 'Gate's firm supplied technology used to trap Chinese dissidents'

Ha, ha, ha. It's very funny for many people to respond to this post and ask, "Are you talking about America?"

The reality, though, is that if you think we have it bad in America, you should really read up on what it's like elsewhere in the world.

Think of it as competition, in the same vein as Linux vs Windows.

Right now America is the undisputed 'king of the hill' or monopoly in world economics and most other areas you'd care to graph. Many other nations work just as well, but they simply don't have teh incredible wealth that the USA has.

Were you aware that the USA spends 1/3 of the money spent around the globe? The GDP of the US is over 11 trillion [US Dollars]. The GDP of the entire global economy is merely 32 Trillion.

The global economy is changing that - we see it as outsourcing, other countries see it as getting US dollars so they can increase their GDP.

If you want to change the monopoly status of the US then you agree to outsourcing, and you should seek to bring other nations to the level the US has rather than bringing the US down.

This, of course, covers nothing about the humanitarian crisis in china

It really is striking to see the level of elitism among americans. I include myself when I say that many in america get a paper cut and don't think about the mere availability of the bandaid as a striking contrast to life elswhere.

So yeah, I laugh when I see the posts asking me if I'm talking about needed gov't change in America vs China. It's really funny to me.

-Adam

> China has a very checkered history of human rights abuses.

Indeed, as does the USA.

Amnesty International has received frequent reports of torture or other ill-treatment by Coalition Forces during the past year. Detainees have reported being routinely subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment during arrest and detention. Many have told Amnesty International that they were tortured and ill-treated by US and UK troops during interrogation. Methods often reported include prolonged sleep deprivation; beatings; prolonged restraint in painful positions, sometimes combined with exposure to loud music; prolonged hooding; and exposure to bright lights. Virtually none of the allegations of torture or ill-treatment has been adequately investigated by the authorities.

"Our extensive research in Iraq suggests that this is not an isolated incident. It is not enough for the USA to react only once images have hit the television screens".

Is freedom really celebrated in India?

Umm just so you know India is a democracy. They don't shoot many people. They don't torture people either.

You don't get around much, do you? Ever hear of Kashmir? Maybe the line of control? Although you are probably right, they tend to use knives more than guns there.

And here's a flash. There's more to Europe than just the EU. Maybe you conveniently forgot about Serbia and Kosovo. Was on all the channels just a bit ago.

Per Amnesty International:
In Europe and Central Asia, discriminatory practices continued to be prevalent in many countries throughout the region. In some countries, ethnic minorites and foreigners were especially at risk of being tortured or ill-treated by state agents; they were also targets for attacks by non-state actors.

Nope, they just deport you if they don't like you.

Serious human rights abuses continued to be committed in conflict or post-conflict situations, particularly in the Russian Federation and in the western Balkans.

Probably "conveniently" forgot about Russia being in Europe, too. All those poor Chechens rounded up and thrown in jail instead of just shot and left for dead (ignore all those news reports to the contrary). What was I thinking?

The story in the London Mirror. Amnesty International, like a whole bunch of human rights groups, is concerned about Guantanamo too.

P.S. I'm not the one who's written your parent's offtopic post.

'Amnesty believes Microsoft is in violation of a new United Nations Human Rights code for multinationals which says businesses should 'seek to ensure that the goods and services they provide will not be used to abuse human rights'. The article basically states that 'Gate's firm supplied technology used to trap Chinese dissidents'

What's wrong with Cuba? I was on holiday there recently - great place.

Cuba is a one-party state that restricts nearly all avenues of political dissent. The government severely curtails basic rights to free expression, association, assembly, movement, and to a fair trial. While it has long sought to silence its critics by using short term-detentions, house arrests, travel restrictions, threats, surveillance, criminal prosecutions, politically motivated dismissals from employment, and other forms of harassment, the government's intolerance of dissenting voices intensified considerably in 2003. In March, on the eve of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, police detained scores of political dissidents and others viewed as "counter-revolutionary" in their thinking. By early April, the defendants--who included such prominent figures as Raul Rivero, the poet and journalist, and Hector Palacios, a leader in the pro-democracy movement--had been sentenced to long stays in prison.

Cuba is only a nice place if you ignore massive and widespread violations of human rights, secret police, and a totalitarian government. Moreover, if you had gone outside the government-censored tourist zones you'd see one of the most repressed places in the Western Hemisphere.

Sorry for this offtopic rant, but statements like these really piss me off:

• Regarding Guantanamo, I have no problem with the US holding combatant terrorists for as long as they deem necessary. These terrorists were not fighting under the accord of any acknowledged UN/Geneva conventions of war, thus they are not privy to the protections of said conventions.

Jeez. Do you know how ignorant that paragraph makes you seem? You need the basic rights like due process and a fair trial to actually establish for a fact that these people are "combatant terrorists".

They may be, but there is no fscking way of knowing, unless they are given the rights, which has been explicitly been taken away from them. How complicated is that to understand?!?

Ofcourse, G. W. Bush haven't understood this at all, but this should be no surprise. I quote: "the only thing I know for certain is that these are bad people". How does he know?

But let's be consistent in our reasoning at least. Since murder is also a sever crime, I suggest we remove all security that the law provides for fair trials, if the poeple are accused for murder. After all they are murderers and don't deserve any legal protection, now do they?

Last I checked, some of these "combatant terrorists" held which were release after only 18 months, was found to be a taxi-driver and his ride. I think you should consider the possibility that the people giving out "terrorists", has aproximately the same credability as those informing the US about Iraqi WMD.

If there is any shrill crying going on, it is on the part of the Slashdot title that singled out Microsoft, even though there were other companies implicated in their report.

Amnesty is not wrong for pointing out that those companies are most likely acting in contradiction to international norms. At no point do they try to equate them with the Chinese government, merely they are making a statement that they should not be complicit.

I recommend reading the actual Amnesty report.

Why the hostility to Amnesty International?

Why the hostility to Amnesty International?

Yep, those damned leftists who haven't put together an annual report every year since 1997 criticizing the Communist Chinese regime.

They couldn't be bothered to put up a page on their website linking to current reports of Chinese abuses of human rights, either.

Come on--this is the Internet. Can't you come up with better leftist conspiracy theories than "AI is in bed with the Commies 'cause they hate Microsoft"?

Yep, those damned leftists who haven't put together an annual report every year since 1997 criticizing the Communist Chinese regime.

They couldn't be bothered to put up a page on their website linking to current reports of Chinese abuses of human rights, either.

Come on--this is the Internet. Can't you come up with better leftist conspiracy theories than "AI is in bed with the Commies 'cause they hate Microsoft"?

Yep, those damned leftists who haven't put together an annual report every year since 1997 criticizing the Communist Chinese regime.

They couldn't be bothered to put up a page on their website linking to current reports of Chinese abuses of human rights, either.

Come on--this is the Internet. Can't you come up with better leftist conspiracy theories than "AI is in bed with the Commies 'cause they hate Microsoft"?

Back up that assertion, so we can rip it to shreds in front of your eyes. Then check out the example of US war crime in Iraq, documented on CNN, in your name, and on your dime. For extra credit, after you wake up to the US hand on the Iraqi meatgrinder, check Amnesty International's actual campaigns on Iraq, and drop the vaporprop.

While you might ignore Amnesty International's indispensible human rights campaigns, neither the humans they've helped nor the public, which is just like them, ignores them. Discard your humanity, your rights, but don't recommend that to the rest of us.

While you might ignore Amnesty International's indispensible human rights campaigns, neither the humans they've helped nor the public, which is just like them, ignores them. Discard your humanity, your rights, but don't recommend that to the rest of us.

While you were sleeping, Amnesty International has been protecting your human rights, as well as those of your fellow humans. Where's some backup for your attack? Or is your keyboard in North Korea's Ministry of Our Flawless Leader's Information, where it's the closest object to a pillow, and is disconnected from sites like Amnesty International?

Are you an idiot? Amnesty is criticizing Microsoft because they are giving tools to the Chinese government that the Chinese government uses to violate human rights. It should be obvious that they are also critical of those committing the human rights violations, not just those providing the tools. But if you need a specific example, try here. Just because every press release doesn't explicitly say "China is bad" (again, it should be implicit in this one), doesn't mean they are soft on China.

The reason they calling public attention to Microsoft is that we Westerners can have a much greater direct impact on Microsoft than we can on China. And if we can get Western companies to stop providing tools to the Chinese government, we can limit the effectiveness with which they can violate their citizens' human rights.

And, BTW, the only people that believe the Chinese government is leftist are people who wish to smear the left. You will be hard pressed to find someone on the left who would identify them as such (take Amnesty International as an example, as they are often identified as a "leftist" organization). Brutal regimes who slaughter their own people have traditionally been called rightwing regimes.

As China's burgeoning economy grows and with its admission in December 2001 to the World Trade Organization (WTO), foreign ownership, investment and involvement of foreign companies in China's telecommunications industry have soared. One foreign investor, Nortel Networks, announced in September 2003 that it plans to invest US$200 million over the next three years to strengthen its research and development capabilities in China.

Amnesty International remains concerned that in their pursuit of new and lucrative markets, foreign corporations may be indirectly contributing to human rights violations or at the very least failing to give adequate consideration to the human rights implications of their investments. In its first report on State Control of the Internet in China, Amnesty International cited several foreign companies (Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Nortel Networks, Websense and Sun Microsystems), which had reportedly provided technology which has been used to censor and control the use of the Internet in China.

Following the publication of this report, several companies dismissed allegations that their company's actions might be contributing to human rights violations in China. Cisco Systems denied that the company tailors its products for the Chinese market, saying that "[I]f the government of China wants to monitor the Internet, that's their business. We are basically politically neutral." Microsoft said it "focused on delivering the best technology to people throughout the world", but that it "cannot control the way it may ultimately be used."

Amnesty International considers such responses to be inadequate, particularly in view of recent measures taken at the international level to hold companies more accountable for the human rights implications of their investments. For example the UN Human Rights Norms for Business, adopted in August 2003, state that:

[T]ransnational corporations and other business enterprises shall refrain from any activity which supports, solicits, or encourages States or any other entities to abuse human rights. They shall further seek to ensure that the goods and services they provide will not be used to abuse human rights.

Amnesty International urges all companies which have provided such technology to China to use their contacts and influence with the Chinese authorities to bring an end to restrictions on freedom of expression and information on the Internet and to urge the release of all those detained for Internet-related offences in violation of their fundamental human rights.

You should read the reports by AI rather than this half-assed newspaper report. You can get the original reports here and here:

Nothing in these reports is "ridiculous". The claims that AI makes are well documented, and are justified concerns about human rights violations. Most of each report is concerned with what the Chinese government is doing, and not with what anyone outside of China might be doing to aid and abet these crimes. They do not acuse foreign companies of human rights violations, but they do ask that those companies exercise some responsibilty when they sell products to China. Comments from the companies in question make it quite clear that they are not even willing to ask whether their products will be used for censorship purposes, let alone refuse to do business when the answerr is "yes".

You should read the reports by AI rather than this half-assed newspaper report. You can get the original reports here and here:

Nothing in these reports is "ridiculous". The claims that AI makes are well documented, and are justified concerns about human rights violations. Most of each report is concerned with what the Chinese government is doing, and not with what anyone outside of China might be doing to aid and abet these crimes. They do not acuse foreign companies of human rights violations, but they do ask that those companies exercise some responsibilty when they sell products to China. Comments from the companies in question make it quite clear that they are not even willing to ask whether their products will be used for censorship purposes, let alone refuse to do business when the answerr is "yes".

From Amnesty directly;

http://news.amnesty.org/mav/index/ENGASA170052004

"In its report, the organization also refers to several companies, including Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Nortel Networks, Websense and Sun Microsystems, which have reportedly provided technology which has been used to censor and control the use of the Internet in China. Amnesty International fears that by selling such technology the companies did not give adequate consideration to the human rights implications of their investments."

Things to note:
1. There are many other companies mentioned here too.
2. If they did not buy the technology from these companies they would have gotten it from OpenSource for free.
3. Its not about profits. Its about using technology for "evil", which OpenSource stuff can do.

All you need to know is in the summary. The article doesn't tell what products or services of Microsoft are being used to abuse human rights and what changes in software or business practices MS should make to avoid being a tool of the oppressor.

Here's an article at the Amnesty International website (dated 28 Jan 04) if you want more. This is the only mention of MS on that link:

***************
Amnesty International remains concerned that in their pursuit of new and lucrative markets, foreign corporations may be indirectly contributing to human rights violations or at the very least failing to give adequate consideration to the human rights implications of their investments. In its first report on State Control of the Internet in China, Amnesty International cited several foreign companies (Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Nortel Networks, Websense and Sun Microsystems), which had reportedly provided technology which has been used to censor and control the use of the Internet in China.(29) [...]

(29) Amnesty International: People's Republic of China: State Control of the Internet in China, ASA 17/007/2002, November 2002.
***********

Well now I'm really confused. That report is over a year old, and there doesn't seem to be anything newer than the link I gave on this topic. It sounds like the Guardian picked up the story because it mentioned Microsoft (but not Intel - hmmm, what is the software running on?), even though the source for the MS reference is old.

It is always good to remember, and to be informed about the present situation.

Here you have some recent news.

It is always good to remember, and to be informed about the present situation.

Here you have some recent news.

It is always good to remember, and to be informed about the present situation.

Here you have some recent news.

It is always good to remember, and to be informed about the present situation.

Here you have some recent news.

Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, reports from the women themselves, etc.

Here's an example of Saudi Arabian barbarism towards women and girls: Religious police make girls die in fire because they aren't wearing headscarves

But what I DON'T oppose is taking out Saddam. Or should we have done nothing? What would YOU have done?

First, I wouldn't have put him in power in the first place. The CIA helped put him in power, and Reagan funneled him all sorts of aid during the Iran-Iraq war. Not dissimilar to the story with our support for Osama Bin Laden and the mujahideen. Our foreign policy for the past few decades has largely consisted of backing bad guys and then knocking them down.

But given the reality on the ground, was Saddam evil enough to go kill thousands of Iraqi civilians, and destroy a functioning nation, to get rid of him? Compared to, say, China, with its domestic repression and the ongoing genocide of the Tibetian people?

Iraq was no threat to any other nation, and while Hussein's regime was brutal, Iraq was hardly alone in being a serious human-rights violator. And the odds are good that someone as bad, or worse, will replace him; or that the country will dissolve into the control of local strongmen.

If sanctions had been used with intelligent, achievable goals, they could have helped bring more freedom to Iraqi without bloodshed. Instead the U.S. unilaterally decreed that sanctions would end only when Hussein was no longer in power - and kept them in place long enough to kill hundreds of thousands from malnutrition and contaminated water.

I was recently offered a trip to China. Before, accepting, I seriously thought about the ethics of the situation.

However, I was never asked for my fingerprints - I would have rejected straight away. Of course, I would have probably refused to go to Tibet unless I had some guarantee of my security by my government (dunno, maybe as an official delegation would suffice).

Chinese citizens didn't seem oppressed -- only poor. While I don't doubt that there are restrictions on civil liberties, it isn't the nightmare scenario. All this good versa evil isn't accurate and isn't productive.

Finally, people do complain about China's human rights record. See Amnesty International's Annual Report. However, these human rights organisations usually get ignored unless deemed convenient by our corporate/political leaders, in which case they go from ignored to evil overnight.

• Obviously you have never lived in a country that kills its OWN citizens. For something closer to your home (assuming USA), check out the Waco atrocities committed by the government, as well as Ruby Ridge. Here is some If you are into films, you can also check out the controversial documentary on it.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the totalitarian regimes in Germany, USSR, and USA's close friends Saudi Arabia and Egypt. A couple of stories on the state of Egypt (USA's 2nd large recipient of military aid)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the damage done to civil rights activists in the 60's by the FBI and the CIA. Laws were actually changed to prevent this sort of thing.
• Obviously you have never been targetted by the police. (I have no proof of this but if you let me track you, I can find out :) )
• Obviously you are not a minority man (particularly black) living in some parts of USA. (Don't know this either. But I can easily verify this if you send your driver's license to me)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the infiltration of the FBI by organized criminals (particularly the Italian mafia in the 60's and 70's).
• Obviously you haven't heard of police fabricating information and jailing people.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the government cooking up bogus charges and jailing people. (Refer to the previous link and do your research)
• Obviously McCarthyism is not part of your collective mind.
• Obviously you haven't heard of John Ashcroft's recent decree to spy on antiwar activists.
• Obviously you believe the legal system represent justice. (I can't prove this to anyone. It is something that you will realize as you grow up and leave the cave that you have been living in--if you actually manage to do that!)
• Obviously you underestimate the power of the goverment.

• Obviously you have never lived in a country that kills its OWN citizens. For something closer to your home (assuming USA), check out the Waco atrocities committed by the government, as well as Ruby Ridge. Here is some If you are into films, you can also check out the controversial documentary on it.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the totalitarian regimes in Germany, USSR, and USA's close friends Saudi Arabia and Egypt. A couple of stories on the state of Egypt (USA's 2nd large recipient of military aid)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the damage done to civil rights activists in the 60's by the FBI and the CIA. Laws were actually changed to prevent this sort of thing.
• Obviously you have never been targetted by the police. (I have no proof of this but if you let me track you, I can find out :) )
• Obviously you are not a minority man (particularly black) living in some parts of USA. (Don't know this either. But I can easily verify this if you send your driver's license to me)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the infiltration of the FBI by organized criminals (particularly the Italian mafia in the 60's and 70's).
• Obviously you haven't heard of police fabricating information and jailing people.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the government cooking up bogus charges and jailing people. (Refer to the previous link and do your research)
• Obviously McCarthyism is not part of your collective mind.
• Obviously you haven't heard of John Ashcroft's recent decree to spy on antiwar activists.
• Obviously you believe the legal system represent justice. (I can't prove this to anyone. It is something that you will realize as you grow up and leave the cave that you have been living in--if you actually manage to do that!)
• Obviously you underestimate the power of the goverment.

From the article, "Maybe, in the end, it's enough to be aware of what's happening behind the scenes as we enjoy this cornucopia of bargains."

This seems to be a rather apathetic and cynical closing statement. Awareness by itself can't do anything. It is not enough to simply be aware of it if someone is in need of help. I would say that while it's likely impossible to avoid products with hidden costs in the modern world, one thing that anybody can do is help support your favorite non-profit, non-governmental organization that is working on behalf of people in dire need, worldwide. Examples include:
Amnesty International , Human Rights Watch , and Oxfam International .

It's no overstatement to say that if you can afford a twenty-dollar DVD player, you can afford to give twenty dollars to charity. You can donate online, with your credit/debit card, right now. So what is stopping you from helping out?

Well, it isn't Israel's debt history that is the issue here...

Woah, woah, woah, woah!

Okay, I didn't support the war on Iraq for many reasons, but to claim that Saddam's not a bad guy is just simply ludicrous revisionist history.
Put down the agitprop and step away from the soapbox.

Saddam Hussein's Baathist Party has done several horrible things that have been well-documented. His regime has a history of torture, oppression, and genocide. The Kurds, the Marsh Arabs, and the Shiites have all suffered greatly at his regime's hands for helping us in the Gulf War and for standing up for their own rights. My mother works with an Iraqi Kurd who fled with her husband to America after her husbands brothers were tortured and killed and had their bodies returned to them in mutilated condition because the two of them were reporters trying to expose the abuses of the regime to the international community. Whole towns of Kurds were killed with chemical weapons for their aid of the UN forces in the Gulf War.

Then you have the draining of Iraq's wetlands as punishment to the Marsh Arabs. An entire ecosystem and economic infrastructure has been utterly destroyed, leaving many of the Marsh Arabs without a means of sustenance and without a home. This is in addition to the usual panorama of torture, kidnapping, and execution that faced many dissidents in Iraq.

Oh, and in case all of this doesn't convince you, how about the senseless, retaliatory destruction of the economic lifeblood of Kuwait that poisoned thousands? You know, the blackening of the skies which was visible from space? Then, there's the man's sweetheart sons who reveal how good of a man he was as a father. How about the horrible life story of a man who was forced to act as a body double for Uday?

I don't think that all necessarily justified us getting involved when we have made a policy of ignoring or supporting many other brutal regimes -- especially when close friends of certain of our administration stand to profit mightily -- but saying that there's no evidence that Saddam's a bad guy is farsical. As to his popularity, Saddam didn't just get 90%+ of the vote. He got 100% of the vote on a ballot where he was the ONLY candidate listed. No candidate gets that kind of support in any healthy democracy, and we are right to question anyone who does.

Why are so many Americans in prison, under third world medical conditions? The war on drugs, primarily, but also idiotic minimum sentencing laws. Where China executes people as a "deterrence", the US lock them up for decades for the same reason, while still retaining a provably flawed capital punishment system. And, by the way, according to Amnesty International:

Seven countries since 1990 are known to have executed prisoners who were under 18 years old at the time of the crime - Congo (Democratic Republic), Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, USA and Yemen. The country which carried out the greatest number of known executions of child offenders was the USA (17 since 1990).

There are many other very serious social issues in the US (insufficient health care, police brutality, religious fundamentalism, sexual hysteria ..), and just waving the finger at China and shouting "Woo, we're so great" is not going to cut it. The US needs to get serious about cleaning up at home before trying to impose itself as the world police elsewhere. Getting rid of your idiot president would be a good start.