I heard a story on the radio today that several cities are ditching Columbus Day in favor of celebrating “indigenous people’s day”. As I was talking to my daughter about it, I was reminded of something a radio host named Al Kresta said (paraphrased) concerning the Black Lives Matter movement. “I agree with the sentiment, but not the organization.”
I have no problems with celebrating the achievements of the various indigenous tribes (formerly called Native Hyphen Americans) or even having a day for it. The problem is that this particular day (Columbus Day) was chosen not as a celebration of the Indigenous People, but as a way to tear down Christopher Columbus, and by extension, the History of the United States.
This isn’t new, though. One thing that’s particularly interesting about this fiasco is that in the early 20th century the KKK decided that celebrating this Catholic was a “Papal Fraud” and burned a cross at the Knights of Columbus hall in Pennsylvania to show their disapproval.2
We don’t have to tear down our founder to honor the indigenous though, if that’s what you actually want to do. In 2016 Rev. Eugene F. Rivers III of the Seymour Institute for Black Church and Policy Studies said
“To celebrate one cultural group does not require that we denigrate another… Rather than renaming Columbus Day, why not add another holiday, Indigenous Peoples Day, to Baltimore’s calendar in honor of Native Americans?”
But a lot of people do want to denigrate Columbus. From what I’ve seen, there seem to be two main reasons for the desire to abolish his memory.
- White guilt. A lot of the SJW ilk are apologizing for their “White Privilege”. 1 They’ve been taught that an entire race is responsible for the problems with every other race.
- They want to tear down the country in general. SJWs are always talking about how the forefathers were slave owners, as well as the sins of slavery. This comes straight from the pits of Marx. No one is going to change the country if they don’t have a problem with it.
SJWs like to point out the failures of our government’s response to the indigenous are the failures, and while there is some truth to this, it’s not a one sided issue. Some tribes were more violent than others. There were wars between the tribes as well as fighting between the indigenous and the European settlers. Some, however have pointed to Columbus himself, though. And while he wasn’t perfect, (go figure, he’s human) he’s not the monster that he’s made out to be. Here are a few of the lies told about him.
- He’s not a conqueror. Columbus wasn’t looking to start a new country, but establish a trade route to India. He didn’t ever realize he wasn’t in India.
- He wasn’t cruel. There have been depictions of Columbus torturing the natives at what eventually became San Salvador, but he didn’t. Some were treated poorly, but not at Columbus’s hand. In fact, his men were given specific instructions NOT to treat the locals poorly. Those rules just weren’t followed. The worst that happened were the diseases, and some have blamed him personally for it, which is beyond stupid.
- He didn’t start the slave trade. Slaves from Africa in America came several years later, although some of the more aggressive tribes practiced it, along with looting and cannibalism.
Columbus was a brave man, but he was a man. What he did is worthy of honoring, as he made the world aware of what eventually would be the home of the greatest country in history- The United States of America.
http://www.kofc.org/en/columbia/detail/christopher-columbus-fake-history.html