Tomorrow is Columbus Day, a federal and state holiday in many states, but why? Why do we mark the day an Italian sailing under the Spanish flag mistakenly sailed into the Caribbean and ignited an era of conflict, violence, and forced catholic conversion across what is known today as Latin America?
Sure, at one point in time it could have been argued that we were honoring the first European to have sailed to the ‘New World’, but we know now that he wasn’t. Evidence today shows that Scandinavians made the voyage to North America hundreds of years prior to Columbus. Honoring Columbus as the first was just a notion of mistaken history. In remembering him today, with his own holiday, what are we honoring? Why do we mark his landing knowing what we know?
Perhaps there isn’t an answer; perhaps it is just to hard to change a federal holiday, bureaucracy and all. But If I had a say, I’d end the holiday, replace it with something else. With what, I am not sure, but I am positive there is something more deserving of our annual devotion and observance.
How about we get rid of “Columbus Day” but keep the federal holiday so we can have a day off just for the hell of it? Everyone wins.
That’s why I said replace it… just not sure with what.
You are right.I hear the cry of those who were the victims of colonization heralded by the voyage of Columbus. But how can we rewind the clock of our history ?
He didn’t even discover American and he was a douchebag. Killing all those Indians just because he could, the greedy bastard. Why are we celebrating this?
Leif Erickson got here first!!
Ummm…actually there were already several million people living in the Americas thousands of years before any other European set foot on the Western Hemisphere. Nice try though.
We celebrate this because we like the funny outfits they wore back then…duh! Joking of coarse, There is a reason but after you remove the options like ” Slaughter helpless Village Day, or Give a new country a deadly disease day, or I was lost but now I’m found day…The obvious answer is…(drum roll)….Columbus Day! Just my two cents, thanks.
I agree 100%. I wonder how we can get this off our national holiday list and off all calendars? How do native american indians feel about this day? But, now that we’re talking about holidays, why do we fall for the other stupid ones like valentines/mother’s/father’s/grandparents day? Seems as if we should honor those we love every day and quit supporting the greeting card companies that are contributing to the demise of our beautiful forests.
hm.. interesting question indeed. but why for example peoople of Russia celebrate Halloween? lol! you know, people just like to have some holiday. it does not matter for them what to celebrate – the main thing is the process of celebration itself and a chance to have one more day off from their work.
You should celebrate Boston Tea Party Day or something.
http://doctorbeatnik.wordpress.com/
I agree with your arguments. It’s a holiday that doesn’t really make much sense.
I do, however, have an alternative to propose…
My wife’s birthday is October 11. I propose that we drop “Columbus Day” and name the holiday “Iveta Day”!
And we can celebrate it by making a donation to our favorite charity (as my wife did; instead of asking for birthday presents, she asked her party guests to donate to Operation Smile).
That’s a holiday that would do a lot of good for a lot of people, plus we would still get a day off.
You know what they say about Columbus?
He didn’t know where he was going, didn’t know where he was when he got there, and did it all on borrowed money!
Columbus…a government employee..how funny, lack of knowledge of the task at hand, spending blindly at the tax payers expense, lies, scandle, deceit,…Hey lets honor him for all time by giving him his own day. sorry maybe another blog
lol just tickled me thats all. have a great day!
Make it: columbus memorial day of repentance for crimes against humanity.
May they all reap in some sort of Karmic hell what they have sown here on earth.
Keep the party, but make it real.
We could make effigies of columbus and the kings and queens that profited from the centuries of genocide, hang them and parade them down streets, and at the end of the day, burn them (safely) hopping at a subconscious level that if there is some sort of karmic justice, that they do burn for each and every life tortured and taken. It could become a real carnival… : )
Should be a day of mourning.
You should read “Guns, Germs, and Steel” by Jared Diamond.
Surely Columbus wasn’t the first to reach the “New World”, but he was the one who made it known to others!
Anyways, I whole heartedly agree that “Columbus Day” should be done away with, and what a comment @travelrat lol ;D
Agreed. This point is probably why I’m sitting at my desk working right now along with millions of others.
http://www.theprettyproject.com
there is no point of Columbus day
http://s8529226.wordpress.com
If you’ve read “The Devil in the White City,” you know that Columbus Day is so named in honor of the closing of the first World’s Fair (aka the Columbian Exposition) in Chicago, around 1893. They closed it around October 18th I believe. We celebrate it because it was the first American accomplishment on that scale. The whole fair was built to show France, right after they built the Eiffel Tower, that we had better architects and could be a cultural worldwide superstar.
Of course, the World’s Fair itself was called the Columbian Exposition in honor of Columbus…but still, today we only celebrate Columbus the man indirectly.
Actually, the first recorded honoring of Columbus took place on October 12, 1792 in New York City, thats before 1893. Later in 1863 the event spread as far as San Francisco, where the Italian community held their first Columbus Day celebration. In 1892, President Benjamin Harrison called on Americans to participate in the the 400th anniversary celebration of Columbus’ first voyage, also before 1893.
The date became an official holiday first in Colorado in 1905. Later on, in 1937, Roosevelt proclaimed October 12 as “Columbus Day” and Nixon in 1971 declared the second Monday of October a specific ‘Columbus Day’ observance national holiday.
The base of history surrounding the observance of Columbus Day pre-dates the World’s Fair of 1893.
Also interesting and ironic random fact, an events that surrounds the World’s Fair of 1893, this fair marked the first time a replica Viking ship was built and sailed from Norway to the Americas to show that it was indeed possible for Vikings to have reached the ‘New World’ before Columbus had.
Hear hear! Glad to see other WordPressers are blogging about this too.
Check out our wordpress blog for today’s like-minded post.
“They would make fine servants… With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want.”" -Christopher Columbus, writing in his diary
While Columbus was certainly an explorer, his story does not end there. He implemented a colonial system of slavery-for-export and feudal tribute / forced labor / resettlement (“Encomienda”) which killed 98% of the population of several million natives on Hispaniola in just a decade. Under no dictator on Earth have we seen that kind of slaughter, percentage-wise. He requested assistance from Spain when his managerial style (‘Any Taino who doesn’t bring me gold this month will have his hands cut off’) didn’t suit the Hispaniola natives (Who at times tried futile armed rebellion and mass suicide in response to their enslavement), and the assistance they sent shipped him back to Spain in leg irons for his “atrocities,” including routine acts of torture. Columbus got a royal pardon by promising to bring back more gold as an explorer. The next Governor after that refused to rescue Columbus when he was stranded on Jamaica for a year, though he managed to survive by convincing the natives of his occult powers using a prediction of a lunar eclipse. His first shipwreck-settlement, where he left 37 of his men behind while he traveled to Spain, didn’t have the same benefit – and after they took to raping the locals it was burned to the ground.
A little more than a decade after discovery, Hispaniola actually had to import slaves from Africa because they had killed off so much of the native population building/working the mines and plantations.
The maps Columbus had as they relate to the Oak Island “Treasure” (that even had “Hitler’s” interest?) and where the fictitious Da Vinci Code oddly ends (but may really fully begin?) the real issue? Media manipulation by who? Armadas chasing who and why? Gold to heavy to sail fast? How does organized crime get a volume discount on art works by contemporary art masters and how highbrow is money laundering? Where there forces at play before, during and after World War II when more “selected” records destroyed in history than even the Catholic Church could organize or hope for? Can a book burning be disguised as war? In war?
Columbus Day? Ask ‘first Nations” people or local unversities around Oak Island about “carbon dating”?
He wasn’t the first but he changed the history of America more than any other arriving before. Its journey towards the unknown was the first step to the creation of all the countries that exist today in the both North and South America (except maybe Brasil).
But Columbus day would have more logic as a celebration in Spain than in in the US.
Here in England we don’t always have reasons for holidays. For example we DON’T have a holiday on St. Georges Day, yet we do have holidays called simply “Late Spring Bank Holiday” and August Bank Holiday”.
Perhaps you could suggest a “Summer’s over, we’re a little sad about that and fancied a day off” holiday??
Anna (www.TheAngloFile.net)
I liked Germany’s Christmas day 1 and Christmas day 2…Repentence day..things that make sense..just me I guess..Take care.
Columbus was a disgusting bastard. He was responisble for countless human rights atrocities and only in America do we celebrate a national holiday for a well known leader and participant in GENOCIDE. Fuck That. I refuse. Fuck Columbus.
Why do we observe Flag Day, for that matter? Or Arbor Day? Ooo, ooo, why do white people get Martin Luther King Jr. Day off? Doesn’t that seem like crap to you? Most holidays are based on pretty screwed up things. Columbus was a bastard, historically proven as such, however: We’re a country of bastards, so why not celebrate the bastard that started the trend that lead to where we are now?
I’m still fighting for Johnny Carson Day myself. It’s a far more relevant and historically important holiday, don’t you think?
~Bob, Counter Culture Clown
Well put!
Why not an Oliver Hardy Day? Or Charlie Parker Day? People could dress up, listen to great old music, have fun, pretend to be miffed with other people who are dressed as Stan Laurel…
http://doctorbeatnik.wordpress.com/
There you go. Steven’s a genius. Laurel and Hardy day. That gives us Brits a great excuse to have the SAME day off as you for a change (in honour of Stan Laurel, born in Ulverston, England), so we can all slack together.
Both sides of the Pond can spend the day celebrating in a humourous and understated way, wearing dapper, gentlemanly clothing and singing the odd rendition of “Trail of the Lonesome Pine”, whilst musing that the current financial crisis is ‘another fine mess we’ve gotten ourselves into’.
Oh no. But would Stan Laurel have met Oliver Hardy without Columbus doing the whole America thing first? Dammit.
But you’re still a genius, Mr. Harris.
Why thank you, Anna. Am a big Stan and Olly fan, as it goes, so would be more than happy to trade one of our boring, meaningless bank holidays for a Laurel and Hardy Day. I am playing noughts and crosses (that’s Tic Tac Toe for the Americans here) with myself, in honour of Stanley.
I have written somewhat of a rebuttal to your post… Well, not exactly a rebuttal, but yet a stronger rationale as to why we shouldn’t observe Columbus Day.
And I’ve replaced the holiday with something else.
I’d really appreciate it if you could leave a comment on my post, it was inspired by your’s. Thank you!
http://immigrantheretic.wordpress.com/2009/10/12/this-is-exactly-why-we-should-be-celebrating-festivus-in-place-of-columbus-day/
I’d vote for Iveta Day. She already sounds “more deserving of our annual devotion and observance” than Columbus.
we do not have to celebrate it
I totally agree! I actually work in a classroom and they don’t say much about the holiday anymore, in fact, we had school today so we barely observed the holiday at all.
You bring up a valid argument in regards to Columbus. Everything you said was valid and to the point. I believe one of the reasons why we celebrate it is because he was the first known man to discover North America. I understand the Scandinavians discovered it way before Columbus did, but in America we need an icon and someone thank for this remarkable discovery of what we now call home. It’s not so much of who he was and what he did to what now is Latin America, but what he stands for. He stands for an iconic figure who discovered America. We lose sight of Columbus as a metaphoric icon as opposed to Columbus as a human being back in the late 1400s. This does make for an excellent debate topic.
Perhaps it helps to consider the effect of his travel to America rather than that he was one of many. I’m convinced his action was the one domino that fell over and really started the future colonization of America.
And do we assume colonization was a good thing? Is it still good policy today?
Columbus is an American hero.
An Italian of Portuguese decent, on his father’s side, sailed under the colors of Spain to Hispaniola with an order from the Pope to Christianize the world, a royal decree to seek gold, spices, and riches, and a personal drive for appreciation and power. That makes him an ‘American Hero’ how?
Columbus is a hero…how so?
I agree with most of the comments here. I wrote an essay about nineteen years ago – I was in the ninth grade at the time – basically refuting the actions of Columbus. My teacher allowed every one in class to stand up and read their essays, all except me of course. Despite it all she gave me an A+. Columbus doesn’t deserve anything but just retribution from God!
Great blog post.
Haneefah
So what? history is full of controversial issues and crack, colmbus is one of the many examples.
We didn’t witness what had happend in his own time , but i think giving him a day for his own is not fair , But hey guys look at the bright side you get a day off from school and work.
Well I guess it is just celebrated for fun,join of cultures and casts.
Becouse even when that conquest was made over 500 years ago, it was made much better than the one made in the nineteen century by the english…just compare Africa and Southamerica, …numbers, and you will see. I am sorry for thouse who hasn´t been tought nor read the treaty of Indias (you are right that it was discovered just like penicyline… looking for results as they thought “our” land was rounded, as it finally was). This is a document where you or they can find, signed in the sixteen century, that there were all kind or rights for the indians recogniced, as well as their souls, as catholics. If you look for the laws of Africaners in the 20th century and the houses of shame and slavety, pooverty, illeneses etc. the britsh empire has broght to their colonies, you will see why the world celebrates the arrival of this old cultures to America.
The other important thing to celebrate is the way the people who arrived mixed up with locals to create a new “raza”, the Latins (not kings, by the grace of Castro and Lula, and Bachelet, or the Kissingers…) just the other way arround the english did in India, Pakistan, Southafrica, Namibia, Kenia, Uganda and so on…)
Greetings from history!!
Well, let’s see. Lief didn’t do anythine with the knowledge and Columbus did. He discovered it for Europe because, you know, those silly Indians weren’t telling anyone about it.
Yes, he was pure evil to the Indians. So, if you’re well and truly horrified, find an Indian and give him your house and property.
The simple fact is that the nasty extermination of the native Americans (who were Asians, so Native Asians living in America?) bites, but we all happily live here without giving it all back, so isn’t it hypocritical to moan and groan? The honest response is, sorry, we conquered you, get over it. Funny, too, we gave them reservations to live on instead of making them slaves like most cultures before this. And who knew? Our way is worse. Instead of enslaving them and the atrocity being recognized so they could be set free and assimilate or not, we give them everything and rob them of any self-respect, initiative, or real identity. Emasculating an entire culture with a system that must be maintained even though it’s horrific, because to kick them off with the demand “assimilate or else” is politically incorrect (which just points out that PC has nothing to do with what’s right or good for people and only with a hollow image of respectability).
Concordo com o post. No Brasil não celebramos o Dia do Colombo, mas sim o “Dia do Descobrimento” destas terras pelos portugueses, o que resultou no mesmo processo maléfico para os nativos americanos. Enfim, celebramos momentos que se revelaram trágicos.
Because that’s the way it’s done. We humans have a strong propensity to do the same thing over and over again. We’re engineered that way. So Columbus Day is to the calendar what the appendix is to the human body.
But let’s take the opportunity to look at the event from a differing angle. The accidental “discovery” of the new world was a major moment on the road to globalization and modernity. As with all of history, there are certainly winners and losers. Even more reason to stop and understand its consequences. Read Jared Diamond’s “Guns, Germs and Steel” to get an unbiased analysis of why European culture became a hegemon. Unfortunately, our tendency to read things as either “good” or “bad,” “black” or “white” goes wide of the mark. The excelerated pace of discovery that is marked by Columbus’s voyage can also be linked to democracy, capitalism and medical science.