My wife grew up in Shanghai, and you'll have to go quite some distance to find someone more critical of the PRC and CCP than she is. And it's with good reason.
She grew up during the cultural revolution, and was largely raised by her grandmother because literally every other person in her extended family was in prison or work camp, not because of anything they had actually done wrong, but for political reasons because the whole family was blacklisted.
And that's not just the old days. Her father died as a direct result of Chinese Covid policy. During the pandemic her cousins still in the country would ask her (on Skype) "is X true?", and largely their perception of what was going on was false. She would exfiltrate encrypted news reports to them - until those started getting blocked. Her dad's estate still has affairs that need to be resolved, but we've decided not to return to China until Xi is gone, as it's just not safe. It doesn't get much airplay, but there are currently a couple of hundred Americans who are being illegally detained in China right now. It's not worth the risk.
My first trip to China was about 30 years ago, shortly after we got married. And back then, I would have said that you were right. Honestly, it felt like for the average person in their day-to-day-lives, the Chinese were less under the governmental thumb than we are. People from the countryside would bring their produce into the city to sell, or cook dumplings and buns to sell on the side of the street - stuff that in America we'd have to get permits for. It seemed that the oligarchy had an understanding with the people: let us control the big picture, and we'll look the other way for the little things. But Chinese politics is a pendulum swinging very widely. From Tienanmen Square and Tank Man, it had swung quite a bit the other way. But today, it's come back 180-degrees. Xi is really trying for a Cultural Revolution 2.0.
These impressions largely match what I hear from other Chinese immigrants - except for Party members, who tend not to want to talk about it at all. I'm afraid that you've been listening to too much propaganda.
the sense i get from my chinese friends are that the CCP is an annoying parent but they understand the challenges both domestic and international and largely agree with the compromises
Dead Comment
You've made an artificially hard example (Ikea doesn't separate units, it is just inches).
What's harder, a 24" object on a 160" wall, or a 59cm object on a 4m 3cm wall?
Or to compare like for like (rounding & unified units), a 24" object on a 160" wall vs a 60cm object on a 400cm wall? Seems the same.
Why can't American companies study the Chinese products and do the same in turn?
Or it could be that the same government of China that less than 40 years ago admitted to killing 200 protesters and likely killed at least 2500, has severe restrictions on religious freedom, and is known for targeting family members of activists and dissidents, is also rounding up and reeducating members of a very publicly troublesome minority group.
They have a well documented history of similar tactics in Tibet over the last 75 years or so. I mean there have been over 150 Tibetans who have self immolated just in the last decade and a half as a protest against Chinese actions in Tibet. I can't think of very many acts of self-immolation protests where the target government wasn't doing something untoward, much less when there's an average of 10 per year.
Given the recent history of the Chinese government response to dissidents, and the terrorist attacks perpetuated by Uyghurs in the 2010s, I'd honestly be surprised if China didn't do something similar to what is alleged.