Leo Varadkar, metaphorically if not literally, may well have deployed the same mannerism in conversing with the Chinese prime minister Li Qiang on one particular topic.

The second-most powerful man in China was here on a flying visit and the two leaders met in Farmleigh. Afterwards, the media was assured that Mr Varadkar raised the issue of human rights with Mr Li. 

Well he might. China is one of the most oppressive countries on the planet.

In recent years, there has been a particular problem with the Muslim minority in the province of Xinjiang. The Uyghur people have been subjected to “mass arbitrary detention, torture, enforced disappearances, mass surveillance cultural and religious persecution, separation of families, forced labour, and sexual violence,” according to a Human Rights Watch report published last year. Up to 1m people were reported detained in what we would call concentration camps. There is absolutely no media spotlight on what is unfolding because the media is tightly controlled in the totalitarian state.

It might be expected that during their high-level meeting the democratically-elected leader of the Irish State might express outrage to the Communist Party-appointed premier of China. And, Mr Varadkar told the media that he did exactly that. He had “raised our concern about the situation in Xinjiang and Hong Kong...and also the forthcoming trial of Jimmy Lai". Mr Lai is a newspaper publisher in Hong Kong who is charged with engaging in “seditious publications”, which basically means writing stuff the communist rulers didn’t like.

What we don’t know is whether Mr Varadkar expressed outrage at various crimes against humanity on behalf of the Irish people or whether he adopted the Con pose, mumbling through his fingers about 'that oul' problem ye have with the fellas back home'. 

The smart money would say that it is far more likely to have been the latter than former.

What we do know is that Mr Li was so pleased with the reception he received that beef exports to China, which had been suspended late last year, can now resume immediately. In that context, Mr Varadkar must surely have felt it would be the height of bad manners to forcefully raise any issues around persecuting minorities and sending them off to labour camps.

Neither was there any opportunity for the media to put questions to Mr Li because being answerable to anybody but the politburo would be completely alien to Chinese leaders. Mr Li also met President Higgins in Áras an Uachtaráin and Michael D, we were assured, brought up that oul stuff about human rights. While the President has a record of showing a keen interest broadly on advocating for the oppressed, one wonders whether he felt at all like the editor of The Skibbereen Eagle who wrote sternly during the Russian revolution that it was "keeping an eye" on Moscow.

So much for the constitutional and democratic leaders. But what about our robust opposition, charged with holding the Government to account? Surely they called out the meek "our silence for beef" policy.

At leaders' questions in the Dáil that afternoon, Mary Lou McDonald trained all her fire on housing. This is going to be the main election issue and she could not be expected on the first day back to show any concern for the Uyghurs while Mr Li was in town. 

Apart from that, she is preparing for government and knows that it just wouldn’t look good calling out the killing and sexual violence at a time when the beef is back on the boats.

There was no word either from Ivana Bacik. But then the Labour Party is also familiar with the requirements of realpolitik and knows that you don’t mess around with beef exports. Ultimately, the only hope of somebody showing a moral backbone rested with People Before Profit. Apart from anything else, they have no ambition to ever be in power so they would be free to give it welly over the flagrant human rights abuses being perpetrated in China.

Instead, most of the PBP crew attended the Dáil wearing Keffiyehs, as if they were refugees from a Christmas panto. They wanted a debate on the destruction of Gaza, which is fair enough, but they began shouting and roaring when they didn’t get their way, leading to the House being suspended. Such a display may well garner a report on the Six O’Clock news across the Middle East, but the complete failure to reference the regime of the man who was in town spoke volumes.

The human rights of some, it would appear, are far more important than those of others for one reason or another, mostly to do with the values and interests of those who claim to give a fig. By now the first consignment of beef should be halfway to China.