[tazjin]

I can confidently say that pretty much nothing I've heard about SF (haven't spent much time there myself other than passing through) would be tolerated in Moscow. It's unthinkable. The worst thing you run into here would be a drunk guy at night or something like that. Moscow isn't exactly an example of a liberal-leaning city though :)

As for smaller cities in Europe like London or Berlin, they're also still reasonably safe (I didn't like night buses in London but that's about it) and the crazy stuff is mostly contained.

I guess a huge part of this is that most countries over here at least have something resembling a working social system.