Proud to have been born in Europe
A few days/weeks ago, my friend Davor wrote an excerpt during his travels in Alaska that reflects safety in the USA, and summarises my own feelings quite well. Whilst I do not agree with everything in the text, I do share the sentiment. Here is my attempt of a translation, and I will link the original post below:
ABOUT THE USA AND MASS SHOOTINGS
We found ourselves in Homer AL on a parade day, so we went to see what was it about. As soon as I was in a crowd, I started to feel uncomfortable. The feeling was similar to the time when I was in the Afgan markets, Israeli buses, or Nairobi shopping malls. An alarm went off in me, and I became aware that in situations and circumstances like this one, something could blow up. A lone shooter, desperate Palestinian, Somalian terrorist. This is exactly how I felt now in the states. In the leading country of the world, in the "land of the free"! I felt my brain processing the inputs collected through my conversations with people of the States and through the media, passing them through my filter of experiences and intelligence, and concluding that this situation is potentially dangerous. That any moment now, some disturbed, sexually deprived maniac could take out a gun and start shooting at the crowd. I suggested [to my wife] that we should leave, get away from there -- the Americans can shove these flags up their asses and kill each other, but we will not be killed today.
This parade did not see a mass shooting, but a day later I read that in a peaceful town in Illinois, a madman opened fire and killed six people on their local parade that was, in many ways, the same as the one we were at. I felt relieved as my feelings that day were not paranoid or overblown. That is the American reality. Over 500 mass shootings happen in the USA per year -- _at least_ one per day! Most of the shooters are not minority terrorists. They are white men.
This makes the USA one of the more dangerous countries to travel in. A vast majority of Americans are wonderful, but some are unparalleled madmen.
On the other hand, we live in one of the safest countries in the world [Croatia].
It's just statistics. Whoever thinks things are better in the States should be aware of these statistics. I love travelling there, but I would never live there. Although it's incredibly stupid to be proud of the piece of land where you were born, I have to admit I'm incredibly happy to have been born in Europe.
