Six Flags will no longer fly a Confederate flag — one of its six eponymous flags — at any of its parks. The announcement came just days after the amusement park corporation initially refused to take down the symbol at its flagship location in Texas.
“We always choose to focus on celebrating the things that unite us versus those that divide us,” a Six Flags spokeswoman told Bloomberg. “As such, we have changed the flag.”
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While a Six Flags spokeswoman said on Friday the parks wouldn’t remove the Confederate flag, three of its 20 North American locations, including the one in Texas, replaced Confederate flags with American flags over the weekend.
Since its founding in 1961, the Texas park has always flown the “six flags over Texas,” or the flags of nations that held control of Texas throughout its history: Spain, France, Mexico, the Republic of Texas, the Confederate States of America, and the U.S. The Six Flags parks, however, flew the lesser-known “Stars and Bars” flag, the first symbol of the Confederate States of America — not to be confused with the more famous design of its battle flag.
Confederate imagery has come under increased scrutiny in recent weeks after neo-Nazis and white supremacists marched on Charlottesville, Virginia, leaving three dead. The march, in part, protested the planned removal of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee, among several such monument removals in the past year.
