Every week, the world sees America’s grief on live television. Another school on lockdown. Another mall shooting. Another community shattered in minutes. Gun violence in the United States is impossible to ignore because it is magnified by global news.
As an immigration lawyer and nurse, I hear the same question again and again from people overseas: Why would anyone still want to move to America?
The answer is simple: because the alternative is not safety. It is silence.
Loud Violence vs. Silent Violence
In America, violence is loud. It explodes in seconds and is replayed endlessly on CNN and Twitter.
But in places like the Philippines or Indonesia, violence takes a different form. It hides in silence. It is not the sound of gunfire, but the empty plate of a child whose food program funds were stolen. It is farmers forced to watch their rice rot because subsidies never reached them. It is hospitals where patients die quietly, not from a lack of skill, but because medicine never arrived.
That too is violence. It does not make headlines. It does not trend on social media. But it kills just as surely through corruption, neglect, and the quiet suffocation of opportunity.
Choosing Which Risk to Carry
Immigrants are not naïve. They weigh these risks carefully.
In Southeast Asia, the danger is that your dreams are strangled by corruption. No matter how hard you work, someone with better connections or deeper pockets can cut you off.
In America, the danger is sudden and terrifying gun violence. But your effort, grit, and persistence can still move you forward.
I have seen both sides. A nurse from Manila may lie awake worrying about her children’s safety in New York, but she also knows their classrooms will be stocked with books and teachers. An engineer from Jakarta may fear another mass shooting on the news, but he also knows his invention can be patented without paying off three government offices.
It is not that America is safe. It is that in America, the climb is still possible.
The Irony Immigrants Notice
Here is the irony: U.S. immigration law vets people to the bone. Fingerprints. Background checks. Medical exams. Financial affidavits. Every box must be ticked.
Meanwhile, in many states, buying a gun requires less paperwork than registering to vote.
Immigrants notice this contradiction. They shake their heads. But they still come, because what matters most is not the contradiction itself but the chance at a future beyond it.
Why Hope Survives
America’s dream is battered, but it is not broken. Gun violence is its deepest wound. Immigration is its most contentious debate. But America remains different because its problems can still be confronted. Protest is possible. Litigation is possible. Reform, however slow, is possible.
Corruption, by contrast, is violence without headlines. It steals futures invisibly. And in systems where corruption is embedded, hope has no oxygen.
The Real Choice
So when people choose America, they are not choosing between perfect and imperfect. They are choosing between visible danger and invisible despair. Between the risk of a bullet and the certainty of a system where merit is often irrelevant.
That is why hope survives in America. Not because it is flawless, but because it is fixable. Not because it is safe, but because it still allows the climb.
We at ONOR Immigration law understand. Corruption kills slowly. Bullets kill suddenly.
But in America, despite the grief and despite the headlines, hope still has a fighting chance.