For context, she had a babysitter coming in the mornings to check in, make lunches, get them off to school, and prep dinner for them. All the 14 year old had to do was help them get inside after school. Microwave dinner. Get kids in bed and text mom updates. This was a work trip and they threatened to fire her if she did not go. The father has abuse charges and the police handed him their kids on top of arresting her.
Why exactly should women have kids in a world that despises them for it and yet demands they make kids anyway? What is the point?
And we have the third largest population, so of course the odds will favor crazy shit happening here.
Crazy shit is happening across the USA. Florida has a unique transparency law for criminal charges.
It’s also got poor southerners literally living next to rich transplants. There are huge clashes between the rich and poor, and it feels like when you leave South Florida and population centers, you’re transported to a 3rd world country. Being poor isn’t a character flaw, but the poor people in Florida tend to be quite racist and exclusionary. Look at the voting record of counties with less than 200K residents; it’s really not that far off from Alabama/Mississippi/Arkensas.
Hence the "mostly;’ there are definitely other factors at play - I just didn’t feel like writing a novel about them.