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There’s a common perception in the U.S. that taking public transit is dangerous. It's actually safer than driving.
(www.scientificamerican.com)
this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2026
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It's a very common thing. People are programmed to think it here. I heard someone mention a bus and 3 other people immediately piped up to agree they would never ride a bus because they would get stabbed/its far to dangerous. Fox news did it intentionally.
The fear of public transit is part of the racism and classism baked into our country.
Yeah, it's kind of odd that Americans seem to be scared to have to interact with strangers. Internationally, the American stereotype is of being very friendly, the person who sits next to you on the bus and wants to have a conversation - which is sometimes a bit socially awkward in countries where we pretty much ignore each other. Maybe they're different abroad? Or maybe we shouldn't stereotype lol
It's not about strangers == danger. I love in one of the biggest metros in the US and we have pretty crap public transport. The commuter lines from the suburbs are full of middle-income professionals, and nobody blinks about those. But transfer over to regular city lines, and it's mostly low-income minority demographics, and people will immediately caution me about taking those lines to get to my office.
Yeah that sounds like a classism thing. TBF we have the same shit here too, and I bet most countries do.
It's not entirely unreasonable either, I've lived almost all my life in inner city areas with all the problems they have. In fact, I've been part of the problem. I've been mugged, stabbed (crap stabbing, he wasn't really committed. But I still gave him my stuff lol), stalked, beaten, hassled cos of my race, all sorts of shit. TBF some - but not all - of that was because I was engaged with that inner city life as a junkie crackhead and occasional runner. Lived much of my life like that.
But underneath that, people make community. There's also lots of good people in those low income communities who will help you if you get in trouble, feed you if you're hungry, just generally look out for a fellow human. I've had a genuine friendship with at least one very scary person. Most people, if they're in their right minds, are pretty much okay.
I'd go so far as you say there's more genuine community in low income areas than there is in suburbia.
Obvs I don't know where you live and you would know much better than me what the risks are and what you're comfortable with. Not encouraging you to step outside your comfort zone.
And it feels kinda facile to say 'No war but the class war!' But it's also true that the wealthy want us to be scared of each other. They don't want us to build community. And that's one really good way of fighting back - just solidarity and acceptance with other people who might be different from us in one way or another.
Sorry mate, it's evening here and I just wrote a slightly drunken rant. But after all the shit I've seen, I feel like most people are generally pretty decent. And we gotta look out for each other.
I definitely agree with your observations on community vs neighbors.
I do take the bus, thru those poor parts of town as it's the only bus route that stops at my office (cheaper real estate, near an airport). There is definitely a need to be more alert and guarded in those areas, but not because of classism. It's because in the US poor == less access health care and mental care and food security. So there's a higher likelihood that a person who smells like piss asking for free bus fare is experiencing some mental issues that may lead to a dangerous situation. I don't think we need to fund better security or add express routes to bypass neighborhoods. I think we need to provide a stronger social safety network to reduce the number of people walking around with mental issues and desperate economic situations.
More likely the Americans who travel abroad at all are just a different type of person. As far as I know there are plenty of Americans who will never even leave their home state, some barely leave their own town. Those are the people who have never seen a Muslim and still think they are all terrorists. Those are the people who think entire cities are constantly on fire due to evil leftists. The people who travel abroad are rarely like that, because they know better.
In other words, we meet the sane ones when they're visiting our countries.
Yeah, in my experience regardless of country the people who want to travel are not the same ones that want a regression to isolationist BS. Especially with the US, where going to another country on holiday is not a casual thing (like with the massive influx of tourists into the spanish coast in summer, for example), the people who are there are generally are the ones that want to be there and are curious about other cultures. I don't know if that 1:1 correlates with being "nice" or "sane", but it certainly sets people up for not being intolerant and that's a big part of not being a jerk.
Also I was curious and looked up the figures on travel rates. According to these rigorously validated sources (i.e. "they looked pretty good to me") it looks like:
11% of US citizens have never traveled outside of the state where they were born. ^[1]^
27% of US citizens have never been outside the country^[2]^
29% of US citizens currently live in their home town^[3]^
^(^^source^ ^1^^)^ ^(^^source^ ^2^^)^ ^(^^source^ ^3^^)^
This is in a surprising contrast to the EU demographics, where:
37% of European citizens have never been outside their home country^[1]^
^(^^source^ ^1^^)^
(I could find no sources for the other statistics for Europe, I'm sorry!)
Important Note:
There are other commonly cited surveys (from far less reputable research groups than Pew, it really should be noted. One of them is literally just an ad for an AI language-learning app) which put the amount of americans that have never left the country closer to 40% (forbes) or 42% (preply) so ymmv with these numbers. Personally, I trust pew over Forbes or some slop factory, but for transparency's sake I felt I should include them!
It is extremely frustrating how often reading into "why are things like this in the US" leads to racism as the explanation
Do you really think at this point it's racism? It's not. Racism, trans, gays, blah blah blah exuse... They care about money. They would murder any person any time for money
The current federal administration has literally implemented objectively racist policies
I agree