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Columbus Day or Indigenous People's Day?

Lursa said:
is it that, significantly, different than the national holiday we celebrate that was initiated by (some) slave owners?
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The main difference is on July 4, we don't celebrate [insert name of the most prominent slave trader of his day who was one of the founding fathers] Day. And if we had originally celebrated that person, I'd fully support ending that holiday and renaming it for someone who wasn't a brutal, genocidal slave trader (we would have lots of options), or calling it "Independence Day" which is in fact what we celebrate.

So if instead of Columbus day, we want to call it, "America's Day" or something, whatever....

I guess the only virtue I see with "Columbus" day is to use it as a way to inform students what Columbus did and what settling this new world actually meant for the indigenous population. We don't have to be continually ashamed of it, nothing we can do to change that history, but it should be our duty as informed people to understand what did happen. But even then, that kind of education does not require a national HOLIDAY to achieve. Just textbooks that are accurate. Frankly I'm embarrassed to admit I was well into adulthood before I had the slightest idea what the actual record of Columbus the man was - until then, I thought he was some benign explorer type - the cartoon version.
 
Dragonfly said:
#1) Do you honestly think the vast majority of Americans know what country Columbus originally came from?

#2) What does his country of origin have to do with the atrocities he's guilty of?
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1. A by-product of the systemic attack on Italians from Day 1.

2. When you dial a number and have to press 1 for English, do you think that's L'Italiano that is being spoke afterward? Who committed the atrocities?
 
Luftwaffe said:
No one cares about some genocidal spaniard who landed in The Carribeans.
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What evidence do you have that Columbus was genocidal? Perhaps you're confusing him with Saddam Hussein. He was also Italian and there is only one Caribbean sea..
 
AlbqOwl said:
It was on the radio yesterday and in the Albuquerque Journal this morning that one of our city counselors is proposing changing Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day. Has a nice ring to it don't you think? Not! You can't make this stuff up.
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I'll keep calling it Columbus Day thankyouverymuch.
 
Why do people care about whether they rename the holiday? It is Columbus Day. The guy was an asshole, so who cares if we rename the holiday to something else. Its not like we are renaming Easter. Some people just look for some culture war crap to get angry about.
 
Grant said:
What evidence do you have that Columbus was genocidal? Perhaps you're confusing him with Saddam Hussein. He was also Italian and there is only one Caribbean sea..
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Columbus, greed, slavery, and genocide: what really happened to the American Indians – Telegraph Blogs

The guy was pretty terrible to Native Americans anyway you look at it. As an eyewitness described it:

… whenever the Spaniards found them, they pitilessly slaughtered everyone like sheep in a corral. It was a general rule among Spaniards to be cruel; not just cruel, but extraordinarily cruel so that harsh and bitter treatment would prevent Indians from daring to think of themselves as human beings or having a minute to think at all. So they would cut an Indian’s hands and leave them dangling by a shred of skin and they would send him on saying “Go now, spread the news to your chiefs.” They would test their swords and their manly strength on captured Indians and place bets on the slicing off of heads or the cutting of bodies in half with one blow. They burned or hanged captured chiefs.
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SouthernDemocrat said:
Why do people care about whether they rename the holiday? It is Columbus Day. The guy was an asshole, so who cares if we rename the holiday to something else. Its not like we are renaming Easter. Some people just look for some culture war crap to get angry about.
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If no one wants to get involved in 'culture war crap' they should leave it the way it is.
 
The funny thing is I started off just busting balls over this complete crock of liberal victimhood.

But, since people took it serious, I've got more of a case than I anticipated.

The Spanish, Dutch, English, Irish, and French have committed more atrocities to the indigenous people of this HEMISPHERE than anyone imaginable.

The Spanish Conquistadors and the U.S. Army have more blood on their hands than a slaughterhouse knifeman.

But you got some numb nuts and a bunch of gullible dupes who want to pick on 1 dego.

Un-be-****ing-leavable.

God people are dumb as doo-doo...
 
Grant said:
If no one wants to get involved in 'culture war crap' they should leave it the way it is.
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Why is it a culture war to say that we should not have a holiday named after someone that brutally slaughtered Indians, even small children?
 
ChezC3 said:
The funny thing is I started off just busting balls over this complete crock of liberal victimhood.

But, since people took it serious, I've got more of a case than I anticipated.

The Spanish, Dutch, English, Irish, and French have committed more atrocities to the indigenous people of this HEMISPHERE than anyone imaginable.

The Spanish Conquistadors and the U.S. Army have more blood on their hands than a slaughterhouse knifeman.

But you got some numb nuts and a bunch of gullible dupes who want to pick on 1 dego.

Un-be-****ing-leavable.

God people are dumb as doo-doo...
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You would have a wonderful point if we had a national holiday to honor any of those conquistadors or genocidal generals..
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
Columbus, greed, slavery, and genocide: what really happened to the American Indians – Telegraph Blogs

The guy was pretty terrible to Native Americans anyway you look at it. As an eyewitness described it:
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You should read your own link. He was never 'pretty terrible' to Native Americans because he never set foot in what was to become America. The continent was named after his navigator, Amerigo Vespucci, and will forever be immortalized as the only person to have two continents named after him. No one else even has one.
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
Columbus, greed, slavery, and genocide: what really happened to the American Indians – Telegraph Blogs

The guy was pretty terrible to Native Americans anyway you look at it. As an eyewitness described it:
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So was like the whole of Europe. That's how this was done in the past. We've gotten to a point now where we mostly don't do this anymore, but Spain was out for riches and land as were all the major powers, when Columbus stumbled upon the Americas, he did what he was hired to do. Claimed what he could for Spain, took back examples of the wealth and reported on the people's there.

But in the end, for better or for worse, he made the trip and is credited with opening up the New World to Europe.
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
Why is it a culture war to say that we should not have a holiday named after someone that brutally slaughtered Indians, even small children?
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Columbus Day is part of the American culture and has been since 1866. It was declared a national holiday 50 years later.

I can see that many of these posters don't understand the spirit of the holiday or the history of their own country. Instead they will accept or invent historical bits and pieces and then make a demand for changes in what they don't have a clue about in the first place.
 
Grant said:
Columbus Day is part of the American culture and has been since 1866. It was declared a national holiday 50 years later.

I can see that many of these posters don't understand the spirit of the holiday or the history of their own country. Instead they will accept or invent historical bits and pieces and then make a demand for changes in what they don't have a clue about in the first place.
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The fact the Columbus was genocidal and had no problem killing hundreds if not thousands of Native American women and children (he didn't even see them as human) is not a fact that people are inventing, but rather a fact that some people want to ignore.
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
We don't call Columbus Day "New World Day", we have a holiday named after a specific man that happened to be genocidal. So once again, it's not comparable to the 4th of July.
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Abe?

What about President's day? That's specific.

You've got Andrew Jackson on our god damn $20 bill!! That's specific.

You've got an entire 2 continents that speak languages in the majority not native to the soil and you're still going back to the dego?

:lamo

You're right there is no comparison.
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
The fact the Columbus was genocidal and had no problem killing hundreds if not thousands of Native American women and children (he didn't even see them as human) is not a fact that people are inventing, but rather a fact that some people want to ignore.
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Columbus never set foot in North America. Please do some research and your knowledge, and thus your opinion, will change.
 
ChezC3 said:
Abe?

What about President's day? That's specific.
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President's Day is actually in honor of Washington's birthday not Lincolns. It is traditionally viewed as a holiday to honor all the presidents in general though.

You've got Andrew Jackson on our god damn $20 bill!! That's specific.
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And given his history we probably shouldn't.

You've got an entire 2 continents that speak languages in the majority not native to the soil and you're still going back to the dego?
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I could care less either way if we rename Columbus Day. My only point is that those that are for renaming it have a good case for doing so and those that are against it don't other than appealing to tradition.
 
Grant said:
Columbus never set foot in North America. Please do some research and your knowledge, and thus your opinion, will change.
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I am talking about what he did in the Caribbean. You seem to be pretty ignorant of the history of Columbus. As I pointed out earlier, an actual eyewitness to his third voyage had this to say about his treatment of the Indians:

… whenever the Spaniards found them, they pitilessly slaughtered everyone like sheep in a corral. It was a general rule among Spaniards to be cruel; not just cruel, but extraordinarily cruel so that harsh and bitter treatment would prevent Indians from daring to think of themselves as human beings or having a minute to think at all. So they would cut an Indian’s hands and leave them dangling by a shred of skin and they would send him on saying “Go now, spread the news to your chiefs.” They would test their swords and their manly strength on captured Indians and place bets on the slicing off of heads or the cutting of bodies in half with one blow. They burned or hanged captured chiefs.
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Columbus, greed, slavery, and genocide: what really happened to the American Indians – Telegraph Blogs

That is the kind of things the guy you are defending did. He even had his men feed live Indian children to dogs.
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
I am talking about what he did in the Caribbean. You seem to be pretty ignorant of the history of Columbus. As I pointed out earlier, an actual eyewitness to his third voyage had this to say about his treatment of the Indians:
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You are talking of what is said to have occurred in the Caribbean and yet refer to them as "Native Americans"? There were no 'Native Americans' in the Caribbean.
 
99percenter said:
We should have a day for the native americans. We owe them debt of gratitude. We took there land and they asked for nothing in return.
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We do. It's called Thanksgiving.




Pretty major holiday round these parts.
 
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