I love outside of Gary Indiana, and yeah it can be dangerous if you look lost or like you have no purpose for being there, but there's also good working people just trying to eke out the same shit living we all are. I hear my mom and sisters say this kind of shit and it's just like. Sigh
Edit; for some fun examples look on any reddit thread about dangerous trips or some shit and people will constantly talk about how badass they were for driving through Gary or St Louis or some shit.
It's not a warzone mayos.
Of course it's a racist dogwhistle. And of course calling out white folks on it makes them extremely indignant at you saying it's racist. It's one of those things about white society that makes me feel insane. You have to pretend it's totally not racist to say things like this and if you imply otherwise people lose it on you.
White people have spent decades carefully crafting these social norms that allow them to be racist while still having sort of plausible deniability that anything they say or do actually has racist motivations.
Edit: it's obvious but of course only predominantly black areas get hit with that label. Small all-white rural towns get that "totally safe" label, ignoring how dangerous those towns can be for black or visibly queer people. Usually right off the interstate is OK but venture off much further than that in some places...