Florida town renames "Old Dixie Highway" after President Obama
Kyle Curtis
They Named A Highway After Obama, And Racists Will Hate Why They Did It (VIDEO)
A segment of the “Old Dixie Highway” in Riviera Beach, Florida is getting rid of its racist past and moving forward by being renamed “President Barack Obama Highway.”
Residents of the city decided to make the name change in order to make a statement about where the country has been and ideally, where it is going.
One resident, Mary Brabham, told the local CBS affiliate, “It’s time to let the past be the past. We are moving forward and do things not for one, but for all.” The mayor explained his vision for the newly renamed road:
According to Riviera Beach Mayor Thomas Masters, Old Dixie Highway served as a reminder that this city was once heavily segregated.
Changing signage is about closing the chapter on racism and beginning a renewed sense of pride.
“We are stepping up to a new day, a new era, and replacing old Dixie with Barack Obama who represents change.”
Mayor Masters also noted that his city is the only city in the country where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and President Barack Obama Highway meet at an intersection.
Since the tragic church shooting in South Carolina at the hands of a white supremacist, America has begun to finally begin reckoning with the legacy of places and monuments that have been erected to honor racist figures and causes across the country. Finally, Confederate flags that represented a fight to preserve slavery have started to come down, while schools and other public institutions have begun to debate the wisdom of naming buildings after unabashed racists and maintaining statues glorifying a mindset that believed in racial superiority.
In the future children will be driving down a highway in Florida named after America’s first black president, instead of a road with a name that conjured up a failed rebellion formed in defense of keeping human beings as property.
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