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What are some reasons a person should not visit the USA?
(aussie.zone)
Vaguely gestures at everything.
You need me to pick just one?
yeah. 2025 is just not the best timing for that activity.
You could get put in jail for no reason and risk being sent to a concentration camp.
Being detained upon arrival and immediately being sent back (if you're lucky) is just the start.
- Gun violence
- Border control and immigration
- Unaffordable healthcare
interestingly, (from the countries I lived in), you get travel insurance for practically nothing. then if you have an accident or need healthcare while travelling you get it all paid, no deductibles or anything.
so foreign tourists in the US actually have affordable healthcare.
Not sure what the fear with healthcare stuff is. If you need medical assistance, the hospital will treat you. 6-12 months later you might get a bill.
Can’t you just laugh about it and throw it away like most ppl here?
can you really do that and suffer no consequences ?
Yes. There’s a chance you have to deal with collections after a while. Most the time the debt just gets written off tho.
If it does end up in collections, you can pay it for a bargain discount (and it’s removed from credit report). Or just wait it out and let it drop off in 7 years.
If you’re needing a loan sometime in the next 7 years, it’s a risk. But there’s certainly no criminal consequences, and they’re not coming after your wages over it.
If you aren’t from the USA, most of that doesn’t apply. They’re not coming after you in another country over medical debt, and they won’t prevent travel into or out of the country. It’s simply not a big deal here.
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To not support USA financially
It's dangerous. People are a 35 times more likely to be killed by guns than my country.
I won't deny the fact that gun violence happens here in the US, but statistics can be deceiving when you're dealing with very small numbers. The article you linked gives a rate of 4.5 per 100,000 people in the US. That would put your country at around 0.13 per 100k.
Out of 100k, the difference between 4.5 and 0.13 is still exceptionally small. So small that your chances of being shot if you live here your entire life are negligible. If you visit for a week or two, your chances are statistically insignificant. If you look at homicides by any means, not just firearms, this becomes even closer.
So while what you say is accurate, you have to look at what it actually means. The United States is not "dangerous" by any stretch of the imagination. 35 multiplied by almost nothing is still almost nothing.
Says only nation where mass shootings occur daily.
You're full of shit. Redefining "dangerous" doesn't make things less dangerous. 35x as dangerous will always be 35x as dangerous. Drop your stupid, shitty numbers, reframe it as 1 in 1,000,000 vs. 1 in 22,000. That seem like enough of a difference? It should, if you're sane. It won't, if you're a gun psychopath or just an argumentative asshole.
You're using "the entire US". Well, tourists don't visit "the statistical entire US". They go to cities, where the people and things are. If you're too fucking stupid to understand there are places in the US that are DANGEROUS, that's not my problem.
Please visit some of these dangerous places. Stay forever, I mean the odds are in your favor, right?
What that data fails to properly explain is that outside of a few counties you are basically never going to see a gun homicide in the US. The city I live in has some of the highest gun crime in the country, but it is almost exclusively in a few small areas that tourists would never really go anywhere near.
Of our yearly gun homicides ~82% of it is African Americans killing other African Americans. Often in gang related disputes in very specific areas in a couple of states.
Depending on where someone is visiting they are likely much safer here than in many other countries on average.
Statistics are a wonderful thing, but it's important to fully understand the data rather than just applying that average to the entire united states without any nuance.
Mississippi had a gun death rate of 29.6 per 100k in 2022.
Rhode Island had a a gun death rate of 3.1 per 100k in 2022.
Both those numbers include suicide by gun and suicide has outpaced homicide for at least the last 40 years.
Another thing to note is that the USA over all has lower gun homicide rates today than back in 1970s.
For comparison Jamaica had 44.7 gun death per 100k in 2022.
The Bahamas had 28.5 per 100k in 2022.
Plenty of people still feel comfortable traveling to those places year round.
The fact you had to name Jamaica and Bahamas, both incredibly poor developing nations as comparison to get remotely close to our gun violence is proof you should not come here.
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It's risky if you're any of the following:
- Black/brown, or from a non-white country
- Queer (ESPECIALLY if you're trans/NB, I left because it got that bad)
- A woman
- Disabled
- Have made left-leaning posts on social media
Even if you're none of those, there's always the chance that your next trip to the mall or store will become the next major event in your life. There's also the slim chance that you might get an all-expenses paid trip to El Salvador. Don't do it, it's not worth it.
Basically if you're anyone except a white cishet man, then don't go there. Even then, you probably don't wanna go there.
ICE
Bit of a shithole innit
Trump
Guns
Trump supporters with guns
Hmmmmmm
- Well, if your not Hitler yourself, you will be put in a KZ.
- if youre a Woman. KZ.
- You have a Gun? KZ.
- You dont have a gun? KZ.
- Youre black? KZ.
- You have porn on your Phone? KZ.
- They suspect youre a terrorist bc you dont have porn? KZ.
- You have Money? KZ so they can cease it.
- You dont have Money? KZ bc poor.
- You have long hair? Youre trans, KZ.
- You have short hair? Trans man, KZ.
- You go to a mens Toilet? KZ.
- You go to a womens Toilet? KZ.
- You go to a Toilet with no Indication if its Mens or Womens? Non binary, KZ.
Want more?
What's KZ?
It's a German abbreviation for "Konzentrationslager" meaning concentration camp. Not sure that's what they meant, though.
Thats what I meant.
Thanks, but from context, it almost certainly is what they meant.
-
Spending your vacation money in the US is sending some of that money to Donald Dump and friends.
-
Seeing how tourists have actually been detained by ICE, it's not even a hypothetical, I'd say the chances of it happening to you are at the very least nontrivial. Given the choice of countries for my vacation, I choose the one where the chances of that are, in fact, trivial.
Having insufficiently pale skin.
The current policies in place by the trump administration make it a little more difficult to visit. Generally it is fine to visit. I have visited int he last and enjoyed the experience.
I recommend not traveling here. If you must, stick to greater urban areas and national parks. Stay out of the interior! Rural and outlying exurban areas could be dangerous for anyone who doesn't appear to be white, English-speaking (but not too educated), and completely conforming to conservative values.
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I'd recommend wiping your phone before going. And some of our busiest airports have gotten more dangerous lately.
Other than that, you'll be fine.
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Dude just open a newspaper it's plainly obvious why not.
I guess if you look brownish, it can be a risky endeavour, depending on where you want to visit exactly. But what do I know, I've never been there
Disclaimer: this depends a lot on where you are travelling from, I'm just relaying things I've heard from friends
If you are travelling with women, they (and you) are likely to be questioned to check for "sex trafficking" reasons. You are likely to have to strip for no other reason than the officer wanting to (regradless of the previous point) If you don't pass as white, or dare speak a latin language, you are likely to face hostility. The food is bad
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If you're white or have a posh Northern European accent, then you'll probably be ok.
If you're brown and have a Southern or Eastern European accent, then you'll be considered "Mexican". And possibly mistreated as the hired help or favored slave.
If you're black, you may get shot by police or persecuted by ICE.
It can happen to anyone, even an Australian police officer who married a man in the army.
Having to explain how you ended up in a death camp in El Salvador when you came to visit legally as a tourist.
gestures around broadly wellll
Are you fucking kidding me? JUST FUCKING LOOK AT IT.
Trying to create an answer that is more universal than our current political situation.
It's too damn big. There isn't any such thing as visiting the USA. You can see a little tiny bit, and what you choose will color your viewpoint.
It's 50+ countries in a trenchcoat. Pan-Americanism, in the US context, is laughable at best and absolutely a shambling nightmare at worst. There's several reasons why our government sucks. But the sheer size of this fucking empire is the top of the list.
Before the end of the century, it's going to Balkanize hard.
Let’s put it this way, I’m a mid 50s Cis white dude … so about as safe as one could get. And I would feel weird about leaving the country if I had to get back in. At the very least I would not have my own phone on me if I travelled.
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this post was submitted on 02 Jun 2025
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Asklemmy
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