Question for Alaska

[RayinAK]

Originally Posted by H'ton

I've seen many shows, and commercials for shows, lately that really paint the picture that Alaska is for people who want to be isolationists.

Is this anti-social attitude really relevant in Alaska?

With the NCAA tournament going on I thought how anti-social Alaska really is with the rest of the United States in multiple ways. The tournament features teams from many states and sports is a huge bonding element for many states and cities within the U.S. I'm an avid sports fan and of course there are no pro teams in Alaska but I can't even think of one major college team that participates with the rest of the country.

Before you say it's a distance thing...remember that he University of Hawaii is active and they participate in a Western Conference. if they got invited, I'm sure they would have played in the NCAA tournament. They even host a College Bowl Game and what.....Hawaii is a 1/3 of the way to Australia.

Also the argument of travel expense is a weak one because, even if you don't fund a football program, a basketball team could be funded by a major University in Alaska. Many small schools fund basketball teams all the time because the teams are relatively small...look at this year's tournament.

There is nothing antisocial relating to Alaskans. We don't have the racial and other riots that happen in some places in the lower-48. We just leave you alone and expect the same from you. That's our attitude.

Besides that, we have all kinds of international and local social events taking place throughout Alaska each year. For example:

1. The Arctic Winter Games that just took place in Fairbanks and North Pole recently
2. The World Beard and Mustache Championships
3. The Iditarod Sled Dog Race
4. The Yukon Quest
5. World Eskimo-Indian Olympics
6. Anchorage Folk Festival
7. The Iron Dog
8. The Arctic Man
9. World Ice Art Championships
10. Stikine River Migratory Bird and Garnet Festival
11. May Day Fly-In & Air Show
12. Gold Rush Days
13. May Day Fly-In & Air ShowSitka Summer Music Festival
14. Mount Marathon
15. Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival
16. Golden Days
17. Athabascan Old-Time Fiddlers Festival
18. IFSS
19. The Open North American Sled Dog Races
20. The Yukon 800


In addition to the ones above, there whole bunch more of events where Alaskans and people from around the world participate. The list is just too long, but a great number of these events take place in the interior of Alaska. The list is just too long to mention them all.

[AKStafford]

Hawaii has 1.5 million residents. Alaska has about 700,000. So that plays into our ability to field big sports teams.
Plus, our colleges have a higher percentage of older adults enrolled for continuing education later in life. So that means less young people that are there for sports.

[jacq63]

Yes, all the locals have been telling us how much they hate summer b/c of all the tourists who INVADE our fair city and bring in all the awful Lower 48 'money' forcing the residents indoors to hide in their basements until September. So anti-social here.....go away. :roll eyes:

[Nephler]

Alaska Fairbanks and Anchorage come to Michigan Tech and Lake Superior State for collage hockey.

[heathen]

Sports are dumb.




(but hockey's kinda ok. And skiing, hiking, hunting, fishing, snowmachining, 4-wheeling, and dog mushing aren't sports, they're a way of life)