Most Liberal Town in Alaska (Fairbanks, Homer: earthquakes, taxi, living in)

[tigre79]

I think the closest thing we have to a wacky religious group here is the anti-snowmachine skiers. And they're definitely not right.

[gobrien]

Originally Posted by frostnip

hmm, a conservative, heterosexual, married, middle-aged, middle-class, white guy who is not a member of a minority religious group reports that he has never had a negative run-in with the religious right. Shocking, lol.

:d

[tigerfan3]

Talkeetna--without a doubt a hippie town. Gotta love it though!

[wildchild_to]

Why worry about the most liberal city in Alaska. Unless you have an agenda to link up with liberals who are anti-oil, anti-logging, anti-hunting, anti-etc.
Just go and enjoy the beauty of the state and the good folks there, if you do that you won't have much time to be "liberal". If you want to live among the liberals Kalifornia is the place and save the Alaskans the headache.

[Alaskapat528]

Originally Posted by wildchild_to

Why worry about the most liberal city in Alaska. Unless you have an agenda to link up with liberals who are anti-oil, anti-logging, anti-hunting, anti-etc.
Just go and enjoy the beauty of the state and the good folks there, if you do that you won't have much time to be "liberal". If you want to live among the liberals Kalifornia is the place and save the Alaskans the headache.

Couldn't have said it better myself .. .

[Metlakatla]

It's a question I get asked a lot in real life. And I don't know the OP so I'm not sure how he/she defines liberalism. East coast or urban liberalism just doesn't work in most of Alaska. In Talkeetna, even the hippies have guns.

[heathen]

Originally Posted by Metlakatla

In Talkeetna, even the hippies have guns.

Couldn't stand hippies until I moved to (non-Anchorage) Alaska. Nowadays pretty much all my friends are either hippies or militant libertarians ...and I'm pretty sure some are both!

[Metlakatla]

This discussion somehow brings to mind the time several years ago when I was tossed from the Friends of Animal's website due to participation in a discussion about the controversial ariel wolf hunts. I am not in favor of the hunts myself, but the conversation there veered off into a discussion of the sorts of things that people living in bush and/or rural Alaska might include in their diets. I explained about subsistence hunting and fishing and that not every community had a store within reasonable driving distance...or any kind of driving distance in some cases, and that wild fish and game is actually a healthier alternative than flesh wrapped in plastic and shipped up from the lower 48. They--seriously---thought that people should get food stamps instead of hunting or fishing, and that more stores should be built. Anyway, my experience with that group led me to the conclusion that money in the form of donations was their main objective, and that they had a vested interest in portraying Alaskans as spending their off time riding around in helicopters gunning down wildlife for fun.

That is an example of extreme urban liberalism, and it just doesn't work well in Alaska. Talkeetna, for instance, definitely has a hippie flavor to it, has for a long time. It started when some land there was opened up for either homesteading or availability through the land lottery--can't recall which--and a lot of young people/families bought/moved there. They all looked like hippies. They weren't, though; they dressed in the type of outdoor clothing that was popular among some hippies because of the whole "back to the land" thing...but they dressed that way because it suited their lifestyle and not because of fashion. They had long hair. Not a fashion thing but there were no hairdressers around at that time and they were too busy to run into Anchorage very often. Besides, it kept them warm. It reminds me of during break up once---I had mud boots on, my baby on my back, hadn't seen the inside of a hair salon in at least three years, and some tourist types were outside the general store and I heard them say something like , "look, there's a hippie". I wasn't, though, I was just wearing what worked for me because of where I lived.

Anyway...yeah, Talkeetna has that rep and it does attract some urban liberals, but you don't have to scratch the surface very hard to find something entirely different.

[Marty Van Diest]

Yes, Alaska is mostly different as far as liberals and conservatives go. Even though I am a right wing activist I know local green partiers pretty well. Some of these people are so rabidly environmentalist that I think it IS their religion.

Still, we know each other on a first name basis and after testifying on opposite sides of an issue at an assembly meeting we can discuss real estate and building issues together in the lobby. We know the others stand politically but still know that we can count on each other in need.

[bongo]

Originally Posted by tigre79

I think the closest thing we have to a wacky religious group here is the anti-snowmachine skiers. And they're definitely not right.

I'm a skier who is not as a rule anti-snowmachiners.... except for the snowmachiners who were dragging 2 friends on an inner tube on a rope on the no-snowmachines-allowed trail out of Eklutna Lake. There we were minding our own business, happily skiing along out to our 3-night rental of the Eklutna cabin when said snowmachiners flew by us hitting me with their out of control rope & knocking me to the ground. That's my only anti-snowmachine experience. And in that specific case my anti-snowmachine stance is most definitely right!