Honestly I have come to see the concept of “whataboutism” as harmful because it allows people to engage in extreme double standards while shaming others into supporting any policy no matter how unfair. I have outlined exactly why here, in this post that got a lot comments and upvotes before it was flagged and buried:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31571324

It’s like if all humans fart, but then someone points out that we must put someone in jail because they farted. It’s actually extremely appropriate to point to a broader group and say “everybody in that group farts, and it is unreasonable for you to expect zero farting”.

It becomes even worse when a person X who is #34 on the list of worst farting offenders is singled out while the other 33 above them are not mentioned. The anti-X people say “well, you gotta start somewhere”. But they paint targets around the arrow X all day long.

I am not saying everyon who makes a criticism does that, but apples-to-apples comparison and having consistent standards isn’t “whataboutism”.

Well diplomacy is built on quid pro quos and whataboutism so I don’t know what’s childish in this, if anything this comment comes off as pretty naive and childish.

I don't think that the U.S. killing an Egyptian in Afghanistan makes it more OK for India to kill a Canadian in Canada (if that's in fact what they did).