It Seems to Be Happening Faster Than Expected

The decline of Florida seems to be accelerating.

Two weeks ago I wrote what became – by a wide margin- the most opened column I have ever written on Substack in the 10 months life of this Evolutionshift Newsletter.  The column published days after was one of the most opened columns I have published.

Given this subscriber response, this column is more on the subject of the accelerating decline of the state of Florida.

Now, there are two statements that all of you know.  The first is:

“ kicking a dead horse”

I have thought about this, not wanting to do so.  However in just the nine days since “Why This Futurist is Leaving Florida” column was published, it is alarming how Florida – and its political leaders- are accelerating toward some reckoning.

The second statement we all know is:

“What one focuses on, expands in one’s life”

So, I might be guilty of this as the research done for the above two linked columns has taken me down a path of alarming discovery.

First, education

In this column, I pointed out the takeover of the top liberal arts college in Florida by Governor DeSantis and how much it has impacted the cities of Sarasota and Bradenton.  36% of all professors have left New College in recent months.  Evidently, there is a noticeable and increasing “brain-drain” of professors out of all of Florida’s public colleges and universities.

Here and here and here and here are all articles about how professors are leaving the state due to the clear policies being put in place by the DeSantis administration.

Given that education is the foundation for the future, this does not augur well for what used to be quality higher education of Florida.

K-12 education seems to becoming narrowed as well, with politics determining what Florida’s children, as noted here and here.  This all just since the column of nine days ago.  Up to that point it was only the teaching of African-American history that was politcized.  Since the column, the AP course on Psychology from the prestigious College Board, has also been banned as it doesn’t match the limitations placed on the subject by the DeSantis administration.

[Why is it that politicians who claim the higher moral ground are always obsessed with sex and what consenting adults do in the bedroom?  I have never understood politicians – of both parties- who use the word “freedom” but deny sexual freedom.  Are they governing  us through their own sexual issues?]

Now we move on to the climate crisis.  I wrote in the linked columns that June had been the hottest month ever.  Well, July has now become the hottest month of the last 100,000 years.  Florida, for at least a decade, has been listed as the state most at risk of climate change.    Hmmmm.

What Governor DeSantis is quoted as saying in this article is:

I’ve always rejected the politicization of the weather,”  while doing exactly that.

Just this week he approved climate denial videos for Florida’s schools. What, after the two hottest months ever in the state’s history?

If he was concerned about the state and it’s citizens, he might consider the clear science and not politics.  If he does not care about what the future of the state and its fast-disappearing beaches, wildlife, and magnificent ecology, why should I stay?

I am really sad about what is happening to the state I have loved all my life.  As I stated here, I am a third-generation resident of Sarasota, Florida and feel that what I have always loved about Florida is fast disappearing.

So sad. So unnecessary.