US human rights

US politicians are hashtaging #SOSCuba on Twitter to interfere in Cuba's unrest. In the meantime, many American netizens are voicing their condemnation against policy brutality and social unfairness in a recently started #SOSUSA campaign - one that yearns for freedom.

It is ironic to see US political elites praise American human rights, democracy, and freedom, while ordinary Americans remain oppressed. The US elites' narrative is severely isolated from middle and lower class people in the country. It diverges from reality. 

It is fair to say that American elites are lost in a delusion of their own narratives. This is why they ignore the public's discontent with them, as well as criticisms against the US from around the world. They are mostly people with misunderstandings of domestic and global situations that have caused this "SOS" tragedy in the US. 

One day before marking six months in office, US President Joe Biden delivered remarks about the economy on Monday. He said, "Folks, it turns out capitalism is alive and very well. We're making serious progress to ensure that it works the way it's supposed to work: for the good of the American people." Over the course of the past six months, according to Biden, the US has realized "record growth" and "record job creation" with "workers getting hard-earned breaks." 

But what Biden has described is in drastic contrast to ordinary people's experience as shown under the hashtag #SOSUSA. This demonstrates that the US has been suffering setbacks with capitalism. This is objectively true - otherwise if the US develops smoothly, it would not need to hype up the "China threat theory."

As a matter of fact, the slightly better employment data doesn't change the fact that there are still a huge number of unemployed people as well as low- and middle-income households. Meanwhile, populism still prevails in the country. 

This suggests that capitalism in the US is now unsuccessful. The Biden administration wants to prove capitalism is good on behalf of the capitalist world. But many signs show that the US, in the eyes of many netizens, is not qualified to do so.

Six months have now passed since Biden took office; yet he failed to achieve his commitment that 70 percent of the US adults would have been vaccinated as of July 4.  The fact is that the American people are facing rising costs of consumer goods. The epidemic rebound has undoubtedly caused more pressure on employment and economic recovery efforts. So Biden's speech is like an unrealistic expression; it pretends that everything is all right in the US.

US politicians wanted to "save" Iraq and Afghanistan, and now Cuba. But look at the countries that the US has "saved." Each of them now is in chaos, with vitality greatly sapped. The US needs to save itself because of its abnormal capitalist development. It should face up to its own problems and focus on solving them instead of diverting attention and conflicts onto others. Attempting to create an external enemy is not the right way to resolve internal conflicts. Even though it can temporarily shelve the problems or delay their occurrences, these conflicts will eventually erupt violently.

Washington political elites have been broken away from the US national situation and ordinary Americans for far too long. Their understanding of the world has been distorted for too long too. As a result, Washington is not even aware of the national crisis now. All problems in their eyes are external affairs - while the US itself still stands as a role model for the world. The US is defeating itself with this logic. American elites only want to serve their own geopolitical interests instead of the well-being of people. But it is increasingly impossible to deceive the people any more.

What the American people need to do now is this: awaken the conscience of US elites. In this way, the country's domestic problems can be solved through internal reconciliations or reforms. The "intervention" of the international community called for by some US netizens will not serve the US well. Instead, it will provoke US political elites and give them excuse to shift blame for domestic problems onto other countries. This will further damage domestic problems that the Americans are facing. It will also bring more damage to the world. This will be a loss for both the American people and other countries.

The author is a professor at the Institute of International Relations of the China Foreign Affairs University. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn