No, but because it's the 4th largest country by landmass of course you're going to have more craziness, it's par for the course.

It's a lot safer then it used to be though, it just seems bad because we don't censor things here compared to other countries, so everyone sees the good and the bad as opposed to just the good

It depends on who you are, really.

If you're a poor, black woman living in Louisiana where the only work you can find is at a chemical plant, your life is going to fucking suck.

If you're upper-middle class living in a city, you're probably going to have a pretty good life.

There are some systems that are just awful by developed standards though. Education, medicine, policing, and politics come to mind. They're not likely to change, so you just have to cope with them. Basically just don't ever get sick or interact with the police. You'll probably die if you do either.

It's not just America. It's the whole world right now.

The areas of the country that are in terrible poverty, with serious systemic issues, vote for the people who refuse to help them. They're so proud of it, and being American, and own the most guns. They hate you for not being one of them. It's a weird place to visit in all these areas.

If you live in a major metropolitan area, it's fine. The country could have a much higher standard of living if we'd band together and get some labor rights and benefits codified. As a worker your treated better, and have more rights in every other western country.

The new American Dream is to get the fuck out of here.

There's a lot of opportunities here. There's a lot of money here. We also have a lot of racism and greed.

Every state has its good and bad. We are out of control with the gun thing. There is a higher chance you will get shot and killed while minding your own business in America than most other countries. We are selfish and not much unity unless you are on one side or there and even then, we have become stupid and gullible. We are violent. We are much more violent in general than anyone I have ever encountered in other countries. Maybe England, but even there, it is not the same. Americans have no problem straight up killing each other. We are getting worse.

Is America great? Depends on who you ask. Is America a place where you still have some opportunities to make a better life for yourself. Sure. But it is not the same as that the pamphlet sold to everyone else. We are far from perfect and in many cases, other countries do things better.

Having said that, it is cool. Just keep your eyes open and pay attention.

America is very nice if you do not really care about how your life negatively affects others.

It depends. I'm a Canadian who frequently crosses the border.

The cities close by the border seem perfectly cromulent, everyone's super nice and accepting. The gas is definitely cheaper, and there is a wider variety of products on offer than in Canada.

There are certainly areas of the US that I'd want to avoid (Florida comes to mind, I would get hate-murdered the very millisecond I stepped there), but the good areas are good. Like someone else said, just don't get caught being poor or with medical issues.

Depends on the socioeconomic status of the city. I live in a city where it's odd to not hear gunshots every night...

America definitely has its issues, but I think we have historically been good about surfacing problems and making sure they're at least talked about publicly, even if they're not fixed. This probably makes it look worse than it is. I feel like even in countries with reasonable free speech, there can be social taboos against talking about certain things.

When doing world rankings, to me it’s a better visual to compare each US region/state to countries as the size of the US is a big factor. Each region has its own distinction. I live in the Pacific Northwest which is (I believe) comparable to most developed countries. If you’re in the southeast, the rankings drop and your probably better off in Eastern Europe. The Northeast US (I.e. New England) is also comparable to most developed countries but the Midwest is moving more towards a theocratic style of localized governance. The US isn’t in a position I’m any region to compete with Norway, Finland, Denmark, etc but that’s why they are ranked at the top.

We’re very vocal when we see a wrong. We’re also a big country, with different priorities in different places. Most importantly, media tends to publish most outrageous stories, for the shock value in attracting attention

My state has the fewest shootings, helped by the strictest gun laws until recently. We’re generally tops in education, near universal health insurance, and quality of life indexes on par with the best in the world. We are generally a safe place for various cultures and preferences, and we’re first in the US to embrace gay marriage We have a strong, innovation-based economy with among the highest pay. We even have a pretty good (for the US) transit system, walkable town centers, an emphasis on sustainability and renewable energy.

We don’t make the news as much because that’s not outrageous: it’s what we want. However I’m sure others may find it expensive, oppressive, or offend their sensibilities

American Dream isn't dead. I'm grinding for mine. It's just definitely harder now.

No, it's not nearly as bad as depicted.

The USA, for all its faults, remains the standard against which other countries measure themselves (and find themselves lacking). That's why every embarrassment and mistake gets blasted across the international media.

Shit country, great pay in a few fields.

If you're skilled labour and not a software engineer, just move to Canada tbh.

Yes it's that bad

Mass shootings, although there are indeed many, are a small percentage of the gun deaths in the US. Most are suicide, next most common are arguments outside bars. Most common weapon in gun homicides is a handgun.

Research shows that income inequality causes crime and you can see that more unequal nations (Brazil, Argentina, South Africa, Israel) have more violence.

The problem with the US is it's a sanctuary for capitalists, capital and capitalism. Worse than anything that the US does or allows to happen to its own people, is what our government/corporations do to "developing nations". Invasions, supporting coups, fighting to suppress labor rights and wages, extracting natural resources with little compensation, overthrowing governments that try to stop any of that, supporting genocide, committing genocide, chemical warfare, biological warfare, nuclear warfare. Any socialist country they can't overthrow they'll try to starve through embargoes.

Anyway, the worst states are ones where abortion is outlawed, lawmakers fight access to public health care or any public resources that don't go to the wealthy. Usually these states are controlled by the wealthy, like coal bosses running West Virginia into the ground. Capitalists have been using evangelical christianity in north and south America to scare voters into voting right-wing on culture war issues like abortion and transphobia. They use reactionary tendencies like hatred of foreigners, hatred of gun control, hatred of schools teaching the history of how our country treated black people, etc, to keep people voting for the right-wingers who also happen to be the friendliest to business.

Both major political parties are right-wing pro-capitalist parties. Some states do have some social safety nets for health care and welfare but being poor is a horrible experience in every state. 50,000 people die yearly from lack of health care access, not including COVID deaths. There's really no state you can live or party you can vote for to get away from it.

I've lived in a few less right-wing states. A friend of a friend was killed by police while he was suspected of shoplifting, trying to run away. Some kid killed himself in my high school while i was there. I live in a town where there's lots of homeless people and syringes all over the place. 3 people in my family died of COVID.

Basically the US is a fascist country. Fascism is when the wealthy consolidate their power over government, in the face of growing violence and instability from growing inequality. The point of fascism is to protect capitalism from these growing threats by creating a police state, deflecting blame for hardship onto minorities, and handing off chunks of the government to the wealthy through privatization. The wealthy and the government essentially merge, they become the same people with the same goals.

8'd say it's only bad by the standards of the first world. Not counting foreign policy here, mind you.