Another Reason to Never Go to Florida

When I was about 10-11 years old, our parents went to Florida for a vacation without us kids. I believe my Dad had some business thing that they both needed to go to. When they returned, nice and tan, I asked my Mom how it was. Her response still rings in my head, “Terrible, there is no reason to ever go to Florida.”

I thought to myself, noted. Keep in mind, a few years later, my parents went through a nasty divorce, so this was probably the beginning of the slow trainwreck.

Granted, we know plenty of people who have decided to move to Florida to avoid taxes, and perhaps they enjoy the hot, humid weather too. I find it hard to believe that most of them applaud how the state is run. We could start with the Stand Your Ground law, which gives citizens the right to use deadly force against someone if they believe it will prevent harm to themselves. There have been countless cases where aggressors have taken peoples lives such as Trayvon Martin and Markeis McGlockton. One mistaken death is one too many.

They banned abortions (so has the Supreme Court now, too). There is also the fact that you can’t say Gay, banning classrooms to discuss sexual orientation and gender identity, and that includes not using pronouns to describe people. You can carry a concealed weapon without a permit as long as it has been purchased legally. Florida also banned colleges from DEI. All of these make zero sense to me considering DeSantis, their esteemed Governor, and his wife seemed to have put some serious cash in their pockets from a non-profit organization she is running. Where that stands, probably nowhere, based on Floridas legal system.

This week, Florida plans to become the first state to ban vaccination mandates for kids in school. In New York, a child cannot attend school without obtaining proof from a doctor that they have been vaccinated. Thank god. Do the powers that be not read history? Do they understand the importance of vaccinations and how it has allowed us all the ability to live to be possibly 100?

Measles, tuberculosis, and whooping cough have begun to rear their ugly heads again. Thanks to social media, that must be what RFK reads, that spouts information without any scientific evidence, has spawned an entire generation of parents who are not vaccinating their kids. I hope that their kids make it out alive. If they live in Florida, it may become more challenging to do that.