Tuesday, October 12, 2004
columbus day
today in north america is columbus day. this celebrating the day that christopher columbus apparently "discovered" north america. he landed in the west indies, thought he had reached india (thus the name). subsequently, he brought european awareness to the rest of the world, and inevitably brought about the colonialization of the western world. basically destroying the indigenous cultures, lives, land, and prosperity.
when i was a child, our history books had nothing but praise for good old chris columbus. what an outright lie that was. in reality, he was a bad man. he killed, raped, and enslaved the natives of the west indies. he literally performed genocide on a race of people. yet, even to this day, he is celebrated in some circles as a hero and discoverer of the new world. he did nothing of the sort. the americas were populated with millions of people long before chris columbus ever set sail.
when i was a child, our history books had nothing but praise for good old chris columbus. what an outright lie that was. in reality, he was a bad man. he killed, raped, and enslaved the natives of the west indies. he literally performed genocide on a race of people. yet, even to this day, he is celebrated in some circles as a hero and discoverer of the new world. he did nothing of the sort. the americas were populated with millions of people long before chris columbus ever set sail.
