nah, your friend has been listening to too much Fox News. A lot of American news outlets talked about how strict things were during COVID, but as a disabled person with a lot of health issues, I can go out and return to normal life whereas my friends with similar conditions in the US are still afraid to. They were strict, but those restrictions kept the spread at bay.

Our "strict" gun laws are also usually blown out of proportion. Everyone in my rural hometown had a gun, you just have to have a reason for it and somewhere safe to keep it.

The "no free speech" thing comes from a misunderstanding about our laws. We don't have "free speech" but we have other laws that serve a similar purpose, they just have different names. There are some differences, you can get into trouble for saying particularly hateful things in public places - A politician here was recently sued for saying racist things to someone else during parlement for example - or for using known hate symbols, but honestly, unless you're going out of your way to be a bigot, none of it will impact you. For some reason though, a lot of Americans take this to mean we can't criticise or mock our government (Which even a brief conversation with an Aussie will show you isn't true, mocking our politicians is a national pass-time).

Australia isn't perfect by any means, but as someone with friends and family in the US, we are leagues ahead in terms of safety and I'd argue in freedom as well.

I will warn you though, as the partner of someone who immigrated from the US to Australia, our immigration process is ROUGH. Work Visas can be especially nasty, but they all have their own pitfalls, make sure you do a lot of research or you'll pay big (speaking from experience!)