In a recent post on X, Sony Thang (@nxt888) attempted to make an argument that has been making the rounds about the United States and its position on China’s role in the Fentanyl epidemic that has ravaged Americans and other people world-wide.
China does not owe the United States a solution to its own crisis.
— Sony Thang (@nxt888) February 5, 2025
The U.S. government, fully armed with power, wealth, and influence, seeks to place its burden on another's back rather than confront its own weaknesses.
The demand for fentanyl is American.
The networks… https://t.co/rrvvZim5Nw
According to Thang,
“China does not owe the United States a solution to its own crisis.
The U.S. government, fully armed with power, wealth, and influence, seeks to place its burden on another’s back rather than confront its own weaknesses.
The demand for fentanyl is American.
The networks distributing it? American.
The failure to curb addiction and enforce domestic law? American.
Yet, the blame is cast across the ocean, as if responsibility can be exported like a commodity.
China has already done more than any other nation—more than even international law requires—to control fentanyl and its precursors.
It classified them as a controlled substance before anyone else.
It has cooperated, shared intelligence, shut down networks, and upheld its commitments.
Yet, instead of acknowledgment, China is met with tariffs, accusations, and coercion disguised as diplomacy.
Do you ask why it is difficult?
I ask in return: Why is it so easy for the U.S. to avoid its own reckoning?
Why does it search for villains abroad when the root of the crisis lies at home?
A nation unable to control its appetite for destruction will never find peace by blaming the hands that do not feed it.
History remembers those who own their failures, not those who rewrite them in the ink of hypocrisy.”
Right… Sony Thang… let’s start with the part where you’re actually right: The United States does bear responsibility for its own opioid crisis. There’s no denying that. The demand is American, the addiction is American, and the government’s failure to curb it is, too. But here’s where your argument falls apart: just because the U.S. is at fault doesn’t mean China is innocent. Far from it.
First, you say China has “already done more than any other nation” to control fentanyl and its precursors. That’s a laughably one-sided take. China was, for years, the primary source of illicit fentanyl flooding into the U.S. via direct shipments and through Mexico. And while Beijing did ban fentanyl analogs in 2019 under U.S. pressure, Chinese chemical companies simply pivoted to exporting fentanyl precursors—unregulated chemicals that are conveniently just one step away from full-blown fentanyl production. It’s a game of regulatory whack-a-mole, and China’s playing along because it profits from the chaos.
Second, your argument that responsibility “cannot be exported like a commodity” is ironic given that China has literally exported the raw materials fueling this disaster. American consumers may demand fentanyl, but Chinese suppliers are more than happy to meet that demand. Imagine a bartender knowingly serving a raging alcoholic night after night and then shrugging, saying, “Hey, it’s his problem.” That’s China’s stance: We just make and sell the poison—you people are the ones drinking it!
Third, you claim China is unfairly met with “tariffs, accusations, and coercion disguised as diplomacy.” Spare me. When one country floods another with deadly substances, whether through negligence or complicity, there’s going to be blowback. The U.S. isn’t blaming China to dodge responsibility—it’s blaming China because Chinese manufacturers, operating in a state-controlled economy, are still enabling the trade. Beijing tightly regulates industries when it suits them, yet somehow these chemical networks thrive in broad daylight.
Finally, your grandstanding about history remembering “those who own their failures” is a fantastic bit of projection. China never owns its failures. Whether it’s the origins of COVID, intellectual property theft, or, yes, its role in the fentanyl crisis, Beijing’s response is always the same: Deny, deflect, and play the victim.
So yes, America needs to fix its own house. But that doesn’t mean China gets a free pass. You can talk all you want about hypocrisy, Sony, but ignoring China’s role while wagging your finger at the U.S.? That’s hypocrisy at its finest.
WORDS: brice.