Is Anchorage really like this or did I just get unlucky? (unemployment, schools)

[smarino]

No, you won't find what the op was describing in every city. I have lived all over this country, and while you do find this sort of thing in some places, some cities you will never find it because the residents will not tolerate it. Galveston seemed out of control to me, while San Antonio was overall a nice place even in the poorer parts. Albuquerque is Dodge City, as is New Orleans, while Las Cruces, N.M. is pretty quiet and clean. Every place is different.

What seems to have set some people off (and I am familiar w/a few of these people from other places on this forum) are individuals that overreact to something someone says, they have their own agendas, and they make those agendas the issue when in reality those things have nothing to do w/ what the thread is about. Then the name calling starts, and everything falls apart. I wish they would go somewhere else. They contribute nothing to the forum but problems.

Irregardless of whether or not the op used PC language or made a statement about liberals in a round about way, it appears that the city is what it is. If it were me, there is no way I would move there even if those sort of troubles were only in certain parts of a place. It points to a systematic problem in the whole area if they have allowed things to deteriorate to that point. It isn't about Anchorage, it's about the people that live there and run the place that are unwilling to do anything about the problems. If you clean up the bad parts (i.e. shut down the dives), enforce laws of behavior in public places, and run out slumlords, the trouble makers will go somewhere else that will put up w/ them.

St Pete is a liberal oasis in a sea of conservative Republicans, and liberals, of which I am one, don't condone this behavior, nor do we have these sort of problems here. There are lots of shelters, and there is no reason for anyone to be homeless on the street or intoxicated in public. The police used to turn a blind eye to it, now they will arrest you or take you to detox. I moved here from Daytona Beach, which was a Republican stronghold. In addition to the conservatives, there were bikers, NASCAR people, rabid gun owners, support our troop people, Christian fundamentalists, just every sort of right winger lived there. The crime was off the wall, homeless were everywhere, and the mindset was that these people felt they had a God given right to be intoxicated in public, roar down the streets w// the pipes open on their motorcycles, set up shooting ranges in their yards, etc, irregardless if it annoyed people or even endangered them. Daytona allows these people to ruin things because they want the money they bring in. Other surrounding cities won't tolerate them and force them out.

[GnomadAK]

I think some of the longtime ANC residents/chauvanists out there are like the famous frog that is gradually and slowly boiled alive, and the OP was the frog who was tossed into that boiling toilet bowl that is ANC and knew danger when he felt it.

There does seem to be the will to actually do something, at least not since Mayor Fink left office. The "solution" was to buy the old Red Roof Inn and make it into a hotel for drunks, not to dry out but to be a safe place to be a drunk. A little time spent in the real world should school a person about what is normal and what is not.

I wonder who is the bigger idiot, the person who has watched a town deteriorate around them for 40 odd years and is fine with what it has become or the person who has seen the rise and fall from 1966 and left for a place where there isn't such madness.

[Music_Man]

We are getting rid of them slowly, you aren't still here. It is still a better place than a lot of cites the same size in the lower 48. If you want a fight, go kick your neighbors dog,and get off the computer.

[Chilkoot]

Originally Posted by smarino

What seems to have set some people off (and I am familiar w/a few of these people from other places on this forum) are individuals that overreact to something someone says, they have their own agendas, and they make those agendas the issue when in reality those things have nothing to do w/ what the thread is about.

Didn’t you make this about your own agenda? Your post really had little to do with any issues in Anchorage. Most of your post should have been in the Florida forum.

The OP went to a seedy bar and was surprised at what went on although I don’t believe all the details. It’s not the bar at The Cook and there is probably something funky that goes on there every night.

The problem is that he went to the seedy bar and was naïve to what can take place and decided to post. Kind of like going to China Town and being angry that all the restaurants served was Chinese Food and then ranting about it because he couldn’t find a pizza.

I still feel the post was racially motivated and discriminatory. The only race he capitalized was Caucasian. No such luck for the other races mentioned. Can you imagine what race he is? I’m guessing Caucasian.

[CaliRestoration]

Originally Posted by Chilkoot

Didn’t you make this about your own agenda? Your post really had little to do with any issues in Anchorage. Most of your post should have been in the Florida forum.

The OP went to a seedy bar and was surprised at what went on although I don’t believe all the details. It’s not the bar at The Cook and there is probably something funky that goes on there every night.

The problem is that he went to the seedy bar and was naïve to what can take place and decided to post. Kind of like going to China Town and being angry that all the restaurants served was Chinese Food and then ranting about it because he couldn’t find a pizza.

I still feel the post was racially motivated and discriminatory. The only race he capitalized was Caucasian. No such luck for the other races mentioned. Can you imagine what race he is? I’m guessing Caucasian.

You don't know what race I am. In fact, you don't even understand the hypocrisy of you argument, claiming I'm white when you don't even know my race, simply assuming I'm white because of your own inherent racism.

Your whole train of though is just some cheap, intellectually low and devoid answer, that it's surprising even for City-Data standards. Your answer to rampant homelessness and substance abuse claims (claims backed by 2011 HUD statistics btw which I posted) is that the claims are "racially motivated".

You know that type of low brow, lack of IQ, ad hominem doesn't work anymore. This isn't 2009 and Obama is fresh into his first presidency and calling someone 'racist' automatically stops the discussion. You do know that people LIKE YOU helped elect Donald Trump, right?

So why don't you go find some actual facts, do some research (hey maybe read something that isn't from the Huffington Post or NYT) and find out what the reality of Anchorage is right now. I saw it with my own eyes (not on just 4th Avenue but EVERYWHERE in the city), and maybe you're blind to it, or just tacitly accept it, but I can tell you one thing, Anchorage isn't full of homelessness and substance abuse because of "racism".

[Frostnip]

Whiteness confirmed.

[Arktikos]

Originally Posted by Frostnip

Whiteness confirmed.

Beat me to it.

Original post was a poll and solicitation of local opinion.

Now, OP is insisting we "research facts" to confirm how bad he knows it to be, based on impressions from one night downtown.

I think he got lucky. After all, no over sized, dark skinned person actually assaulted him.

[Frostnip]

Don't get me wrong, I think Anchorage (or at least big swathes of it) are pretty unpleasant, either they're jacked up, or because they're smarmy suburban sprawl. But this is a lot of melodrama for one rough night out in a rough part of town, like, I came to a dive bar looking for the northern lights over the tundra and instead I found sad drunks

[Metlakatla]

The iii hat didn't tip you guys off?

What is it with that bunch here lately anyway...Stormfront sending out the trolls again?

[CaliRestoration]

Originally Posted by Metlakatla

The iii hat didn't tip you guys off?

What is it with that bunch here lately anyway...Stormfront sending out the trolls again?

So owning a III hat is being a white supremacist now?