It's pure in the sense that rights aren't being totally stripped away (barring the overturn of Roe v Wade) and that you don't have the same president for decades regardless of what the general public think. Democracy structures have flaws in them, but people are able to freely point them out. We're able to look at black sufferage and say "why do we keep doing this? This is wrong." We're able to look at wealthy people getting wealthier by not paying taxes and say "That's wrong that they're not paying their fair share."

I believe that in dictatorships saying something as simple as that would make you a target and a threat. That something is wrong with you and that you're "mentally unstable."

The thing about whataboutism is that we can all look at anything in the world and ask "what about..." and list a particular flaw about it. These systems aren't perfect, but there are some that we can look throughout history and see that while some things are appealing, there are some that do way more harm than good. Autocratic regimes being one of those things that gets worse and worse over time.