Comment by jiggawatts | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jiggawatts | Hacker News Reader

By the way, this is the primary reason I've never travelled to the United States.

The US is missing out on tourism because people overseas read horror stories like this and scratch it off their want-to-go list. I categorise the US alongside wonderful places like Saudi Arabia, China, and Russia as a place where human rights aren't.

I'm a white male of Christian background, I'm not on any "lists" that I know of, and have no reason to be. I work with government departments in my home country and have multiple clearance checks, some of which are very thorough. I sail through airport customs checks in every country.

But clearly the US is number one mainly at being a police state. It's the world's richest third-world country. It's authoritarian to its core.

In our country we have state-local police, one branch of federal police that exists only to protect politicians and a few other special duties. That's about it for uniformed people with arrest powers. Oh, technically we have the Office of the Sheriff for enforcing court orders, and I think Border Patrol aren't technically Police. I don't even know. It doesn't really come up as an issue for law abiding people, irrespective of their skin colour or time of year. Oh sure, you hear the homeless drug addicts complain about "the pigs" loudly, but... yeah. They're bound to.

Meanwhile, allow me to list the US police forces or police-like groups that I know of the top of my head just by watching US-made television shows: State Troopers, Local and county police, Sherrifs, DEA, ATF, DHS, Military Police, FBI, ICE, Marshalls, Campus Police(!), Secret Service, and I'm probably forgetting a few.

This is why the black-lives-matter riots are still going on. Your nation's law enforcement is a militarised, authoritarian nightmare. For someone who doesn't like being "not arrested for 18 hours" for "looking wrong" and using cleaning products, it's a place to avoid, not visit.

Reading this article in 2013 scared me off as well. A few years later, I had no choice but to visit the US and had 0 issues getting through CBP and TSA. The former was especially surprising (and a relief) to me, as my purpose of travel was not tourism or business. I came there to undergo an outpatient operation, so I had prepared lots of proof and documentation to show to border patrol officers. Because while this would technically fall under "medical tourism", I had heard this purpose of travel is somewhat likely to get you denied entry. The officer didn't seem to care one bit. After being asked the routine questions and answering truthfully, he asked me one trick question: "So, you're here on business?". I said "No" and then I was let through. No issues at TSA either. Being white and Dutch must be pretty powerful.

Probably around 2015, my brother and I left the US for the first time in our lives for a vacation in Italy. We both got out just fine, and I got back in just fine—but my brother was harassed by the TSA. My brother is a white American—unmistakably American. English is the only language he speaks. We don’t have any background that you’d think would lead to questioning. We were travelling with extended family, though we were all adults by that point.

One part that I found particularly odd: when they pulled him aside to question him, I tried to wait for him, but was told I needed to continue through a one-way, armored door with no window. I later found out that they asked him why his ticket said he was traveling with family when his family wasn’t with him. Fortunately, our mother was pretty far behind us in line, didn’t realize he had been pulled aside for questioning, and called for him to hurry up. I’m told that allayed their fears and he was released.

He came out of it pretty rattled. We had already been forced to stand in line for over an hour--which was taking a toll on our elderly grandparents, who weren't permitted to sit. He was visibly shaken and disoriented.

We eventually came to the conclusion that he looked a little too American. Cheap, university-student clothing (e.g., free sunglasses handed out by a university). They must’ve though he was trying too hard to fit in. He didn’t set off any alarms; he hadn't even made it to the security checkpoint yet. They pulled him out of the line.

> Campus Police

I went to a fairly large university in the UK, about 11k people on a self contained campus. I think there was a designated police officer for the university. I don't recall any security guards per-se, but there was a "porters" who looked after the main building, and there were a couple of bouncers checking ID on the on-campus bars (to stop townies from getting in)

Is it not just normal police officers with perhaps some extra training on dealing with student matters?

Often they're just security guards to escort people at night or break up loud parties in the dorms. They call real cops for crime things.

> The US is missing out on tourism because people overseas read horror stories like this and scratch it off their want-to-go list. I categorise the US alongside wonderful places like Saudi Arabia, China, and Russia as a place where human rights aren't.

As someone who has been in Saudi Arabia, China and the US, I can say that your view of reality is severely incorrect. I encourage you to visit the US before making this kind of statement. (Disclaimer: I'm European)

I did not notice anything in China either (and been there a lot for work) as I don't notice anything in the US. Actually; things like borderpatrol and policing (and the treatment you get from these two gov agencies) seem far worse in the US than in China if you did nothing wrong. But we know the reality ofcourse; just saying that appearance/visiting does not tell you a lot.

Never had a single encounter with the police in the US while I lived there.

I do agree that the US border is the toughest. I assume much of that is because of how many people try to illegally immigrate to America (and how hard it is to get them out once they're in)[0]. America is perhaps the only country where pretty much everybody coming in is a potential future illegal immigrant. Some of it is perhaps indeed unreasonable but in no way does it represent the experience you'll have IN the country.

But again, never had a bad experience with them. Always opt out of full body scanners and that has never been an issue. It just always feels much more crowded and slower than other places. That's my biggest complaint.

Many countries essentially have the police forces you listed but they may just be a department in some bigger organization. The American setup is just much more decentralized.

BTW China and Russia have perfectly boring borders. Yet inside of China I did have some not-so-pleasant encounters with the police just for failing to register my address with them. And again look at how the Chinese police is structured. It's pretty boring like most places, yet it TRULY is an authoritarian country.

[0] which again just proves how not-authoritarian America is.

I traveled extensively to the US (I am French).

The border is horrible. It is something which I hated, one feels like cattle and is treated worse. The other one similar to that was in Russia.

The border authorities look all psychopathic and I wonder if they are selected as such.

The agriculture guys after you pick your luggage are ok.

As for the police inside the country, I had 3 encounters over 20 years and maybe 50 trips.

One was when I asked for some directions on Phoenix. This is the normal thing to do in France but here the lady was perplexed as of why I am asking her. Nice but really surprised.

The second one was on a road in the middle of nowhere in the SW. It was night, we were driving and ther was a single light on our lane. We slow down to a stop, look at the police car, no reaction on their side so we drive on. The car rushes after us, bright lights, the cop yelling at us with his gun out and my bowels almost giving up.

He asked for our papers, I asked if I can move my hands which were on the roof and I think he recognized an accent. He relaxed a bit, said yes and I proceeded to explain every move I was doing.

He had a look at the papers and let us go. My friend lightly peed himself.

Third one, a year ago. I am driving with my family entering Paso Robles. My gps tells me to turn left. I go to the left turn lane but it was the wrong one, the right one is 20 meters further down the road. Quick glance around and I drive forward, against the rules.

Sound and light signal, I see a big police car behind. A young cop walks to my car and asks me jhghjhffcjjhgvbk (this is what I understood). I ask him to please repeat slower, to what he glances inside the car, sees two kids grinning in the back, us in the front and says "you are free to go, have fun and drive carefully"

So it is a mixed bag, based on three data points.

I've travelled to Saudi Arabia a lot, and have never been detained or even asked anything. Their customs have always been friendly, so it probably does not belong on that list.

Mind if I ask what country you live in? It sounds like a place we could learn from.

I'm guessing this could apply to roughly any west European country.

IMHO, the parent might be in a former british colony, judging by their spelling of ‘colour’ instead of the American ‘color’.

It also depends on what spelling corrector you prefer. In Europe you are more likely to choose British English than US English.

I'm not sure how important the difference is for a non-native speaker. For me it definitely isn't, and I mean no offense. It's just, color or colour, both foreign words so its gonna be whatever the default software thought appropriate. But we're digressing :)

I'm Australian, but does it matter?

I could be describing New Zealand, or Canada, or Belgium, or Finland, or any number of western countries.

FWIW, I've travelled extensively in Saudi Arabia, China, Russia and the United States. I find the US easily the scariest of the four, because it's where I have by far the highest likelihood of being shot, both by criminals and by law enforcement.

Anecdote: I once ventured into a post office in central New Orleans (the touristy bit) in the search of some stamps. The post office happened to be located inside a courthouse, with airport-style security to get in. When I started to take off my backpack so I could put it in the X-ray machine, I was greeted with very agitated shouts of "KEEP YOUR HANDS WHERE I CAN SEE THEM SIR!" because -- I realized afterwards -- the armed security thought I was going to shoot up the place.

Seriously, a lot of this is just not the case in any sort of real, lived, day to day experience kind of way.

And please, if you haven’t been here, why are you making all these statements about this place you’ve never seen?

It feels very aggressive and critical of the country where I live.

It is basically hate speech.

The black lives matter protest -- which are primarily a reaction to police violence and racial profiling -- have been a on the news here every day for weeks.

I also know of the Rodney King Riots, just to name another similar incident off the top of my head.

I live in Australia. Name one incident with our police that made the national news in the US, off the top of your head. (Using Google is cheating!)

When I turn on the evening news here, I see US police violence against our journalists: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-06-02/channel-7-journalists...

I see our citizens being outright murdered by police, despite being white and blonde: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Justine_Damond

The last local police killing that I'm aware of was this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindt_Cafe_siege

There was also some incident in the last year or so that looked like suicide by police. I felt bad for the officer involved, and apparently they had to get counselling because they were so distraught afterwards.

Meanwhile we're hearing about US police forces killing people roughly weekly during the protests against excessive police violence.

It's flabbergasting that you think these facts are hate speech. This criticism is warranted. Certainly, many hundreds of thousands of your countrymen agree, loudly.

I am a white American who never even travelled outside the country until I was an adult. The very first time I had to cross the border, I ran into issues. It’s very real, no matter how American you are. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23626963

I’ve been harassed by police in other contexts when they followed protocol incorrectly and tried to cover their asses. Lawyers tend to sort that out quickly, but what about people who can’t afford lawyers?

At the same time, I’ve had police officers help me and my family, and I’ve generally gotten along quite well with law enforcement. But in all these situations, they weren’t acting as LEOs; they were acting as social services.

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