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I've never been to Baltimore myself, so I have exactly one Baltimore story.
A family member of mine is really into road trips and camping--not quite the "hashtag vanlife" sort, but he has been to all 50 states, driven up to Alaska, visits all the national parks along his routes, etc. He's always the family member to play the "every place has good people and bad people" card when people start talking about good or bad places; he is prone to smugly defending this by pointing out that, yes, whatever city you're talking about, he's probably actually been there, and no, you probably haven't.
In all his many travels, the only place he's ever had a problem was Baltimore. I want to say it was in the last year or two; he stopped for groceries in Baltimore--it wasn't even a destination--and had his window smashed in. He'd left a CD wallet (remember those?) on the passenger's seat of his car, and that was apparently sufficient inducement. I have a hard time imagining why someone would smash a window to steal 30 CDs in the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand and Twenty Two, but then--I have a hard time imagining why someone would smash in any car window that was not, say, between them and a dying person or animal.
Of course, this family member is now quick to point out that lots of people get their windows smashed in, say, San Francisco, too, and that his one bad experience shouldn't be taken as an indictment of a whole city. But the fact remains: Baltimore is where it happened.
There are a lot of places I will not go for any reason short of, maybe, a family member's wedding. Baltimore and San Francisco are thus on the same list as China and Mexico. "But there are amazing things to see there, and amazing people to meet!" Indeed, but there are safer places to go, equally filled with amazing things to see and amazing people to meet; I could spend my whole life traveling to amazing places that are not crime warrens or failed or totalitarian states, and still never get to see them all. So why in God's name would I choose the risky ones?
You're missing out not visiting Mexico City. The murder rate is similar to that of Phoenix, there's cops on every other street corner with rifles, and it really is an amazing place. Incredible history, architecture, etc.
Last I heard, the air pollution was really bad there though.
It's not that bad in the summer (under 100 usually). In the winter it may be worse, but I've never visited in the winter.
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Unless you're a spy, or someone valuable enough to your government that China could get concessions from treating you like one, there's very little risk posed by the Chinese government. There are currently three Americans that America itself considers wrongfully imprisoned in China.
Looks like about 2.5 million Americans visit China each year.
It's a similar risk for Chinese nationals visiting the West. If you're the Huawei heiress then maybe you should be careful. If you're a nobody then it's very unlikely the state will visit trumped up charges upon you.
Actually if you're a professor the risk looks less trivial, there are a lot of cases of professors being prosecuted and found not guilty.
Specifically, I have published some academic criticism of the Chinese government under my real name, and I had some past associations with a Chinese national who disappeared (probably he disappeared on purpose, to avoid being disappeared by others, but I don't actually know for sure) a few years back.
This is all sufficiently small time that I would give myself better than 90% odds of being fine if I were to ever visit China... but the same could probably be said of Mexico. Even a 100% safe and successful tourist jaunt to either destination would involve a lot more nervous checking over my shoulder than could possibly be worth the trip.
Mexico is actually pretty safe if you stay on the beaten path- Americans who get murdered or kidnapped mostly leave the tourist track without paying protection money.
Your guided tour of Mexico City pyramids or all inclusive resort trip are pretty safe.
I was quite surprised recently to learn that Acapulco, which has always connoted "resort getaway for rich Americans", has become a cartel-controlled hellhole.
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China is just about perfectly safe. I've been on multiple multi-month and multi-week trips to China to work and to visit in-laws and have experienced zero issues. The air quality is horrible in the winter. That's my only complaint.
I've been to China, too; I got pickpocketed once, but aside from that it was great.
An example: one time I was hanging out in a place with a lot of foreign students, when a Chinese lady came through asking if any native English speakers wanted to earn some money recording English-language instructional tapes. I got into her car, and she did indeed drive me to a recording studio where I read out a bunch of grade-school level stuff and then they paid me.
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Probably this is what makes it a nice city for me to visit. Cheap, low pressure, less crowded than NYC or DC or SF.
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As discussed in this post, I had the experience of a junkie getting into my building's garage and smashing every passenger side window. There are some people that really are just terrible enough that they're perfectly happy to trade $200 of your money for the possibility of finding 50 cents in your cupholder. Baltimore has more of these people than most places.
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I also won't ever travel to Baltimore for any reason anymore. I used to go fairly frequently as a kid to see Orioles games with my family, my dad being a fan, and Cal Ripken being kind of a local hero. As a teenager and young adult in the late 90's and early 00's, we used to go often for Otakon. That was definitely when I began to notice weirdness.
One year the guy manning the desk at the hotel straight up stole some of the cash we used to pay for the room, and we didn't realize it until we went to check out and they said we still owed $100 that hadn't been paid up front. Being suburban teens, we were just confused, tired, in a hurry to leave, and dutifully paid again. We didn't realize we were stolen from until we had time on the drive home to talk about it.
Year after year the encounters we had with street people got weirder and worse. To this day, Baltimore had some of the scariest, most destitute hobos I've ever seen. One guy tried to lure us down an alleyway with the promise of prostitutes outside the convention center.
Many years later around 2019 we went to see Joe Rogan in Baltimore. The show was great, exiting the parking garage after was an experience. A car next to us, instead of waiting their turn, had the girlfriend just stand in the middle of the line of cars so he could back out. Cars kept going around her. Eventually he kirked out and just went for it, fuck the guy behind him he might back into. Then he spent the entire 30 minutes it took to slowly trickle out of the parking garage leaning out his windows, screaming at the guy in front of him who didn't let him in to get out and fight him. This being two cars behind us, my then pregnant wife was terrified he would eventually pull a gun and start shooting in our general direction, because Baltimore. And that was the last time. It's just not worth it.
On one of my trips to Baltimore, I took a cab somewhere. My buddy and I were in that same boat (a bit older I suppose), but obviously seemed like rubes to our cab driver. He drove the wrong way, I absolutely believe intentionally, running up the fare. I had enough geographic sense of the city that I realized what was happening and hopped out of the car at a stop. My buddy, being even a bit more of a rube than me, was attempting to pay the driver as I was informing the driver what my opinion of him was; I did eventually get him to just get out, but he didn't seem to really get it until I had explained to him that this asshole was stealing from us.
I've been to some low-trust places in the States, but Baltimore is pretty easily number one.
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A bar so low it's painted on the floor.
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