This attitude strikes me as deeply anti-intellectual, that you aren't allowed to compare things because comparision automatically means you're equating A with B. I doubt you (or most people) even live by this. In our minds most people compare The Ukraine with Russia, and come out with an opinion (sometimes Ukraine is righteous and good and Russia is evil, or vice versa, or somewhere in between). Pondering that comparison doesn't mean you are thinking/declaring Ukraine == Russia.
1: to represent as similar : LIKEN
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
—William Shakespeare
2a: to examine the character or qualities of especially in order to discover resemblances or differences
compare your responses with the answers
b: to view in relation to
He is tall compared to me.
The test was easy compared with the last one.
3: to inflect or modify (an adjective or adverb) according to the degrees of comparison : state the positive, comparative, and superlative forms of
I'll assume you were using definition 1 above, and apologize somewhwat for my harsh take. I don't think that's what GP intended with their comparison, I think GP was using approach 2a.
Edit: For curiosity I looked up "compare" in Merriam-Webster's: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/compare
1: to represent as similar : LIKEN Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? —William Shakespeare
2a: to examine the character or qualities of especially in order to discover resemblances or differences compare your responses with the answers
b: to view in relation to He is tall compared to me. The test was easy compared with the last one.
3: to inflect or modify (an adjective or adverb) according to the degrees of comparison : state the positive, comparative, and superlative forms of
I'll assume you were using definition 1 above, and apologize somewhwat for my harsh take. I don't think that's what GP intended with their comparison, I think GP was using approach 2a.