Happy Thursday! Hell, intentions, etc.
After much debate, the Hillsborough County Commission voted not to remove a Confederate memorial statue from outside downtown Tampa's courthouse, and to instead add some pro-diversity artwork to the wall behind it. You know, I can see some validity in both sides of an argument over glorifying a past economy dependent upon slavery versus sweeping history under the rug. But at the end of the day, if you feel like you have to do what amounts to adding a permanent sign that says "BTW, WE'RE NOT RACIST THOUGH" next to a statue, you're kind of going, "Yeah, this is a pretty racist statue."
Well-meaning visitors to Ana Maria Island beaches who are marking and decorating sea turtle nesting sites are actually fucking things up by breaking the law and making the work of qualified wildlife monitors harder. Nature: STOP TOUCHING IT.
A Lutheran church in Riverview was vandalized with spray-painted swastikas, anti-religious invective and various other dumb crap that doesn't suggest "homegrown terrorism" so much as it screams "bored, stupid teens growing up in Riverview." The community is pitching in to help clean up the damage, and hopefully the mastermind behind the defacement will soon swap costly vandalism for the comparatively benign role of bassist in a really, really terrible local metal band.
And finally, Jimmy Buffett contributed to Rick Kriseman's re-election campaign. Do with that information what you will.
