I'm not sure how we shoehorned "China Bad" into the discussion.

I'm not, but you've identified a a thing as American without looking at how the rest of the world operates and how some practices may be an international standard or at least more uniform than just one country. I didn't say "China bad", I brought up that China performs the a similar filtering of students; you applied the label that I was saying "China bad".

It sounds like you're angry at the American system, a system you know, and think other systems must be better without understanding how other secondary education systems work. Other countries may do some things than the USA, but a lot of the basic structure that you complained out is more universal than you think.