You're not in Disneyworld anymore: Florida's 'shadow country' laid bare by photographer who spent months traveling through the Sunshine State's wild side

Errrrr, maybe not choose eh?

Poverty is certainly not a choice!! Would you like to live this way? No one would, nor do they.

....pretty hard to get out of poverty especially when born into it .They don`t have the welfare system that we have here and I imagine jobs are pretty thin on the ground,even more so for the people who have basic (or no) education.Pretty grim I reckon,I would`nt really say for most, it was a life choice!

You are absolutely dead wrong about Florida. Evidently, you've never traveled much in Florida - if at all.

Matt, I like that your comment might delay some people moving to Florida, but anyone that has traveled this state to any great extent knows that your statement is false.

Wadda you know.

Why must you put down something that you know nothing about, Matt? Does it make you feel good? FL is a beautiful state with a lot to offer other than DisneyWorld. Maybe you should try it sometime.

Where do you live ??? Florida is beautiful. Remember the caption : I love where you vacation. You must live in the hood and probably can't afford a burger, for you to say such things.

That's him in the picture on the stoop!

Celebration, Florida, probably one of the most beautiful areas in Florida, but I do not wear blinkers and can see the absolute poverty that exist outside the tourist spots. You just have to drive the secondary roads from Orlando to Naples, another wonderful place, to see the tin home shacks etc.

Yup, you're absolutely right there, aren't you. The entire poor population is because they don't want to work. Well thanks for clearing that up for us.

You have to have transportation to GET to a job to start with, which means you need money. It's too easy to pontificate that poor people are lazy people, and a LOT of Americans do that. (No doubt from behind their desks in warm houses with a nice dinner to look forward to.)

Oh here we go again.

I think many Brits dont realize how absolutely huge America is. We have states larger than your entire country, and over 300 million people. We also are a country that believes strongly in individualism and state rights, which means we want the culture of Florida to be different from that of Vermont to that of Arizona, etc etc etc. I'm not saying nothing should be done about poverty, but America is just a really large country with a LOT of land, and that's initially why the country was founded- because people didnt want to participate in the English land-rental/feudal system, they wanted their OWN. So land ownership and country life is really a huge part of our country, as much as city life is. you just see city life more on television and in movies.

That's what happens when you vote dumbocrat...

Denial much? Just google poverty in the United Kingdom and see the pictures. The US offers opportunities to everyone.

Of course there's widespread poverty in 'murrica, the percenters have most of the money. The little they let slip has to stretch over 300 million people. No way everyone makes out well from something that skewed.

There's no poverty in Great Britain, seriously???? There are poor people almost everywhere in the world.

Green, Florida is a 'Republican state' at the state level where most decisions affecting these areas are made. But yes, part of what your seeing is that wealth in our huge country is in the hands of a few and doesn't really spread out to these rural areas.

I'm English myself but I moved to America just over a year ago. Total culture shock. As a kid I was obsessed with America. It's always portrayed to us as this land of plenty, of great things and huge shiny buildings. Seriously the very first thing I noticed on the way to my newly purchased home was the poverty. Never in all my life, have I seen such hovels. Houses, not even houses really, but what they call trailers which are like our caravans. So run down and dilapidated that you can't even believe a person lives there. Plastic at the windows they cannot afford to replace. It's not just the trailers, as I said, houses too. These little tiny houses, like a summer house you'd build in your garden, falling to pieces. Yes there are pretty and lavish places but I'm telling you, Britains poor live like rock stars next to these guys who can't even get medical attention a lot of times and resort to gluing things shut. Minimum wage here is barely enough to pay bills and eat.

Oh and I forgot to mention there is no council waiting lists here. It's shelters and soup kitchens. When I say shelter I mean just the night. No hostels like in the uk. They don't put you up in a b&b if you need. I was absolutely horrified to find out that a friend of my step sons is homeless. He has some mental and emotional problems but through the day he sits in subway in a Walmart for the free wifi. Talking to his friends on their breaks. He eats in soup kitchens and at night it's back to the shelter. Loads of cots in one room with the rest of the homeless men. He's 23. See a minimum wage job here is barely enough to pay your rent, bills and food. I tried to help my step son find a place to rent, couldn't do it. He'd of had to share. Don't even get me started on medical insurance and the price of prescriptions. I needed iron tablets. Pharmacy wanted over 100 dollars! I'm thinking insurance must not cover them, no they'd covered 150, 100 was what was left.

what has capitalism go to do with it? Just because there arent bright lights and massive clubs/bars it doesnt have anything to do with capitalism. Maybe a tired, broken community where many people have left to earn a better living up the road in a city..... maybe the community is broken, or people have just given up and dont want to have to work too hard..... broken cars, buildings and tired/bored looking people is nothing to do with the Capitalism. Until someone comes up with a better way, 'capitalism' is here to stay, it gives alot of us cheap food, homes, clothes and we can pay taxes so we can send children to school and hospitals....... let me know if you think some kind of communist state (ie Korea) has that kind of comfort

No, that's freedom for you.

Agreed

No it isn't.

muppet

Wow idiots actually believe you? So let me ask them. So why is hardly anyone living there?

We've certainly had better days here.

because we help everyone else first

Guess you don't travel much.

All because of the GOP.

Yes we have grinding poverty. Some people love it. Some people can't care for themselves but can't be locked up. Our poverty is unique because it is self inflicted . Most get their welfare and drink or drug it before they buy food. They would rather play scratch off lottery tickets then buy new cloths. You can't really help them out of poverty you can only hope they do not breed and create another cycle of poverty

You're right -- Ice, we got it here. That's why we don't need anymore fugees from this country or that country --we can't even take care of our own. And a lot of these poor folk just sit around, waiting on someone else to give a hand out. There's no pride here anymore.

There are some parts of every place that aren't nice, but I live on the nature coast and it's the most beautiful, tranquil place to live.

@Debj, Florida itself is a beautiful place. The people are another story. Yourself excluded of course :)

Ha¿..guess that's why so many are scrambling to 'get out' of Florida and not many are moving in¿¿¿NOT. Do your homework, hgUuozds!

As a native Floridian, Id rather go "off the beaten track" in the Everglades than spend a moment in Miami!

Completely untrue.

Sort of looks like North Philly.

Or Baltimore, Chicago, East St. Louis, Camden, Memphis, Detroit, the list goes on and on. I'd venture to say you're much safer in rural Florida, than in most of our inner cities.

It has the third-largest population in the U.S. It's gonna have problems.

These pictures do not represent Florida. These were handpicked to show decay. The pics themselves are poorly composed, but if it keeps people up North from moving down here I'm OK with that.

Luke Wamwater - So is the other parts of the words hand-picked but not the affluent ones.

Who were? Citation?

But that would have not kept the powerful elite in control, as elections do.

Left or Right - it's always the bankers that are pulling the strings.

Like Illinois and Chicago? Democrats have run that city for over 70 years and it's become a war zone.

And the scariest parts of Florida are nothing compared to Gary, IN, as the UK national pointed out. Another Dem run city. Sad.

I have lived in Florida for over fifty years and driven and flown a small plane all over the state. You really have to go looking for scenes like these. Many look like they were taken right after Hurricane Andrew. I live in a middle-class area of privately owned small three bedroom/one and a half bathroom houses with neat front lawns and pleasant backyards filled with tropical fruit and flowering trees. The same is found for miles around in all directions. Many of the photos are mislabelled.

Those Afr-Americans in the photos are Republicans? By the way, this is another of Du Vallon's lies. He claimed to live in the "very, wealthy" enclave of Miami Gardens; those were his words. Miami Gardens is a mostly Afr-American populated slum with a large number of Jamaican immigrants.

Labyrinth, Hot Springs;... This is the Ozark Mountain genius that stalks liberals on this site, attacking them with his idiocy. He recently said the Treasury department and the SEC have little to do with the economy. He claimed that there is no Russian section in Chicago and that Rogers Park was on "the river" (7 miles away) He claimed that Biochemistry is the study of mosquitoes and viruses when it's the study of neither. He claimed yesterday that a gold toilet seat would be warm because it "holds heat", when it has a very low "heat capacity", adding physics idiocy to his long list of Ozark Mountain genius. And then said an article on Trumps supporters being uneducated wasn't on this site, when it took me two clicks to find it. No need to tell him where you live or have lived.. He will make it up for you anyway, and if you disagree with him, he will stalk your posts for months. If you're a liberal, just get used to him.

Hot Springs, Arkansas isn't in the Ozark Mountains. It's in the Ouachita Mountains. There is no Russian section in Chicago; you called it the "Ruska" section which isn't a Russian word. Chicago doesn't have an equivalent to NYC's Brighton Beach. I never said that the Treasury Department didn't affect the economy; you're stretching what I said. I said the President didn't have as great of an impact on it as Congress. I did not say gold could "hold heat." I said it was a good heat conductor and probably warmer than porcelain. Why are you putting things in quotes that I didn't write? Why do you lie so much? What's the title of the article it took two-clicks for you to find. I list my sources, you either make them up or claim false sources in the hope no one will look. When someone does, you launch into ad hominems. You're making a fool of yourself again, youngster.