I think that everyone so far answering on the thread has been right on. The US is a wonderful hodge-podge of interlaced cultures and history that has tended to make us more of a tossed salad than a melting pot. Pick a place, any place, and you will find a layered textured background that may seem endless.

As to whether there is as great an East vs West as North vs South, the short answer is NO, there was no East vs West WAR.

As to the thread "F" the South. I got a few laughs out of it, but the South is not to be taken lightly. Southerners have a unique identity through loss, occupation, and major values shift imposed from outside. They also have a pride of arms. But southerners were also slaves. Southerners were also French Canadians evicted by the British. Southerners are also native Americans and Hispanics. And Southerners have been recent Presidents of the whole US of A.

I went through the South on a motorcycle with Massachusetts plates. I was heading into what the locals call 'swamper' country in Georgia to see the Okefenokee Swamp, and a bit nervous. I remember asking a local gas station attendant what the people were like and he said something akin to "swampers" being independent and kind of contrary.
I gave him a look and said "All I want is a chance".

He gave me a look back and said, "That's all they want."

I felt much better about things, and had a wonderful trip through the South.

Don't confuse Texas with the South. Texas is Texas. It was an independent country for a whole three years and they won't ever let you forget it. In Alaska we say we will someday split the state in half and make Texas the third largest state, but in their hearts Texans still feel they're the biggest state.

Rather than go on about how poorly understood we all are, I'd rather celebrate some of the bright folk who I think really caught on to who we are, if indeed we are anything. Historically, there is that classic by the great French traveler and author Alexis De Tocqueville "Democracy in America", right up to "Letter From America" broadcast by Alistair Cooke for most all his adult life.

As to East versus West, having grown up on both coasts, there are profound differences. The West Coast smells totally different than the East. Compared to Europe, not so great. California is typecast as tolerant but shallow, New England as egotistical and cold (but once you've lived in a place for three generations they begin to accept you). In the West, California is distinct from Utah is different from NEvada. Coastal is different from inland which is desert. Then there are mountains. I'd link up Wyoming with Idaho, Eastern Washington, Montana, and the Dakotas. There is a spectrum of culture almost everywhere you look. These are truisms, but when you're actually dealing with people you find it's the people you know and actually talk to and make friends with who matter. That's true the world around.


Alaska is (pen) insular. The rest of the country is "Outside" , or "The Lower Forty-Eight". And we don't care "How They Do It Outside".

If I'd generalize about Americans, I'd say a sense of optimism, idealism, and space. A bit too much pride, a bit too little humility, a great sense of self-criticism and no lack of confidence ever, ever, ever.

In the end it is the observer who effects the observation. If you are open-minded you will find people who are open minded. And that's true in most places in my experience.