So, why should anyone visit the US anymore? Although, as a brit I’m not automatically going to get fingerprinted, why should I risk it? From what I can tell, thanks to the US Patriot act, if I visit the US, I basically waive all my human rights. If the government decides I am un-american, then they can lock me up in camp x-ray indefinitely. As a foreigner, they can deny a trial, access to a lawyer etc.
I’m not saying this is likely, but it is possible. Why should I set foot on american soil and take the risk?
As far as I understand it, immigration control checks have always been quite tight in the USA anyway, but that aside, is there any particular reason that you’d not want to meet any of the requirements described in your linked article.
As you well know, the US has a hell of a lot to offer in terms of landscape, human endeavour, spectacle, nice people, etc.
On the criteria of your OP dismissing the US as a destination, you’d be dismissing most of the non-developed world too. Anywhere other than the developed countries you’re quite likely to waive your human rights as well.
My personal take: yes, the way the US denies rights to non-citizens sucks arse; but no, it’s not as bad as parts of the third world.
I think you’d have a lousy time here, as you seem to be unable to imagine any the reasons the US is initiating these checks and seem to sincerely believe that our foreign visitors have no human rights. I doubt actually speaking to Americans in America will change your mind, and so you may come across in a way that will guarantee the sort of defensive, sarcastic reactions you’re dreading. Unless you’re prepared to hear the American point of view, maybe you’re better off delaying your vacation. I’m jealous, though, wish I had the cash to be able to travel overseas! It’s my lifelong dream.
Not my intent. Although I do find this a little insane. No one seems to be asking exactly how this will stop terrorism. Can you really tell that from someones fingerprints?
And I realise that these checks won’t apply to me as a brit (as it says in my OP), but this seems to be just the tip of the iceberg. From this side of the atlantic, it seems that foreigner now equals criminal in the US. In fact worse, as criminals do have they’re miranda rights, etc. Frankly, I’m not sure what my legal status would be in the US at the moment, and I think thats what worries me.
Fair points Jjim. I wanted to go because I meet a lot of interesting people on these boards. I’ve never actually left Europe before (although I have travelled quite a bit in Europe). Thanks to the EU, I have rights all over the place. Do you really want to compare yourselves to the worst parts of the third world?
Mehitabel: It does seem as if I would have no human rights in the US. However, I don’t know the entire situation. If you can correct me, I’m more than happy to listen.
The chances of you, as a U.K. national, being subjected to anything beyond a couple of cursory questions upon entry are extremely slim. Probably about what I experienced entering the U.K. in November. “Who are you visiting? How long will you be here?” and that sort of thing. Oddly enough, once I explained my American friend was married to a Brit, they lost all interest in asking me questions.
If you’re that nervous, it’s a wonder you ever step outside your front door. I mean, you could get hit by a truck, right?
The linked article does not support the above statement. Even if it did, does the OP have any reason whatsoever to believe that US officials are locking up visitors wholesale, or that he or she would be targeted for arrest merely for visiting the US?
The linked article mainly references attempts to better track persons who overstay their visas. I’m don’t particularly agree with visa laws that discriminate entirely on the basis of which country a person is from, but given that this practise has been law for a long time, what specific objections does the OP have?
If the above is not enough, how about this? I work for an European oilfield services company with an operation in the US. We have a number of foreign nationals who work legally in the US, several from countries at which the tighter visa requirements, presumably, are aimed. I’ve not heard from these people of any particularly onerous harassment by the authorites in the past two years or so, whether whilst entering the country or once here. In a few cases out of dozens of entries, employees entering the country with valid work visas were questioned about thier intentions and their papers examined and validated. In one case, a Canadian employee was refused entry due to failure to report a conviction on a minor drug offense some years previously. In no case that I’m aware of, were these employees treated especially rudely or threatened with arrest themselves. To my knowledge, this is not significantly different from the treatment random arriving visitors may have been subject to prior to the tightened visa regulations. YMMV.
Well, if you don’t engage in criminal activity, don’t smuggle things, don’t violate the terms of your visa by disappearing and taking a job or something and don’t belong to any proscribed political groups back home (for example, what might happen to a Brit is that they may be active in a mosque in London that is run by an idiot who preaches hatred of the US, something which is easy to keep track of) you will be treated very nicely. The vast majority of deportees are people who lied about their intentions when they came here. But as long as you don’t cop an attitude about being the Enlightened European Renaissance Man amongst the savages in a bar, you should be just fine. If you do come, please visit Ground Zero, and understand why we, in our blundering and uncharted way, are desperately trying to balance having the free, open society that the murderers of 9/11 took advantage of so cynically with being safe. There’s a lot of controversy about these measures in America too, you know, but the only way we can stop these guys is disrupt these networks, and the best way is to stop people from coming here to begin with.
Well, one reason to visit now, rather than later, is the rapidly diminishing number of uncancelled flights from your country to the U.S.
Am I the only one who sees no connection between the increased “security and alertness” and the actual absence of terrorist attacks in the U.S. over the past two years? I mean, surely the level of security is at least just as high in Baghdad, but yet…
I really don’t see the fingerprinting and photographing of people entering a
country they don’t live in as overly Orwellian. It makes perfect sense to me and it wouldn’t bother me in the least to submit to it somewhere else. The reason it makes sense for the US is for the amount of freedom you get once you get here. Were you seriously thinking of a trip to the US or were you just looking for a excuse to bring up this issue?
Several of the 9/11 hijackers were in this country illegally, by overstaying their visas. New efforts are in place to better track this so that we can 1)Readily know who has and who hasn’t overstayed and 2)Easily identify them if they do. It’s really that simple.
If you have evidence that any significant % of UK citizens visiting the US have been arbitrarily detained, you’d be correct in statying away. If not, you are simply ranting about something that you have no facts to support.
Your username implies that you might be of Middle Eastern ethnicity. I don’t mean to pry, but if that’s true, is that part of your concern?
As soon as foreign tourists arrive at U.S. airports, we take away their luggage and IDs, separate the families, quickly and quietly kill the children, and send the parents to “camps.” There they are forced to labor in airless sweatshops seven days a week, and when they drop from exhaustion, we grind them in MacDonald’s hamburgers.
