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ATLANTA (FOX 5 Atlanta) - Some civil rights activists say they will protest Confederate monuments on the eve of Super Bowl LIII.
The coalition to remove Confederate monuments in Georgia appears to be widening. The NAACP and SCLC are now joined by the Southern Poverty Law Center and an independent ad agency.
The group held a press conference at the Center for Civil and Human rights Thursday. They announced an anti-confederate rally Feb. 2 while the world is watching Atlanta.
“We want to show the world that there is a better way, a more noble way by eliminating these symbols of confederacy during prime time,” Rev. Timothy McDonald remarked.
The coalition talked about the statue of former Governor and statesman Richard B. Russell in the front of the Georgia State Capitol... as well as the statue of Former Governor Herman Eugene Talmadge in the backyard of the Capitol. From the mammoth rock at Stone Mountain to the much talked about obelisk in the Decatur Square ... these groups say they are symbols of hate.
And they have found an ally in an independent ad agency, 22squared, that will launch an education campaign in February through an app on your cellphone.
“You have an app called invisible hate that you download onto your phone and if you are standing in front of a monument, it will tell you the true reason the monument was built with quotes from what the person really said in his or her time,” 22Squared programmer Josh Campo Explained. The group also supports a state house bill that shifts power over the statues back to local control.
The Sons of Confederate Veterans vehemently opposes any legislation to remove what they call symbols of heritage. They believe “removal and modification is nothing more than an attack on true historical facts and is highly dangerous and evil.”
Georgia’s Speaker of the House says attempts to change a Georgia law that protects such monuments has not yet been brought to his attention.
“We had an African-American female who came really close to being elected Governor of Georgia. If that doesn’t speak to the progress we have made, I do not know what does,” Speaker David Ralston said.
The February 2 march will be as close to the Mercedes-Benz Stadium as possible and will likely start at noon. No specific location has been selected. The coalition says there will be a second phase to their educational campaign that will include going door to door throughout the state educating the public, so they can, in turn, contact their state lawmakers to support legislation to remove the symbols.