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Stop celebrating Columbus!!!

DeletedUser7853

US history was fictionalized for years to show only the positive impacts of exploration and cultural encounters, when the reality was that most indigenous people encountered early on were massacred and enslaved by many explorers who viewed them as another resource to be exploited in the regions they were exploring. But especially in Columbus's case; when he couldn't get them to provide the big gold deposits he was convinced they had access to, he started shipping them off to sell as slaves in Spain where many perished en-route and then the remaining died while in captivity. He tried to recoup his losses by capturing the rest of them from the Bahamas and ended up destroying over 250,000 people, completely ending the race of Arawaks.

Here is the whole entry made by Columbus, which FOE is also showing under the Columbus event but only partially:
"They ... brought us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which theyexchanged for the glass beads and hawks' bells. They willingly traded everything they owned... .They were well-built, with good bodies and handsome features.... They do not bear arms, and donot know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge and cut themselves out ofignorance. They have no iron. Their spears are made of cane... . They would make fine servants....With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want."

If anyone else wants to read more factual history, this is a good resource:
http://disciplinas.stoa.usp.br/pluginfile.php/159605/mod_resource/content/1/Zinn_Peoples_History.pdf

Here in the US, there is a big push to stop celebrating Columbus with a holiday and four states have in fact changed that day to "Indigenous People Day" with good success.

Even though I have enjoyed FOE for years, it makes me ill to participate in the event that glorifies one of the biggest terrorists in history. Please get rid of the Columbus event and change it to Indigenous People event, at least here in the US. Thank you.
 

DeletedUser8152

Whether Columbus should be celebrated or denigrated is an interesting question but off topic for FoE. Whether FoE should have a Columbus day event is on topic, but given that we don't know if this is intended as an annual event or just a one-time thing, I'm not sure how relevant it is.

Since the bulk of the OP is dealing with the question of Columbus in general, I think it would be better in the Debate Hall forum.

That said, if someone posted a more narrowly focused proposal that FoE not celebrate Columbus Day next year, I think it would be suitable for discussion here.
 

DeletedUser23366

Ignoring history whether good or bad is inappropriate as well. You are correct it was not all benign but you need to view things in the context of time and not just ignore them. I don't see this as a celebration but an acknowledgment of an event that forever changed the world, some for the worse and but also for better.. If we don't both individuals and civilizations can never learn and improve.
 

DeletedUser8152

Personally, I think that individuals should be judged by the norms of their society, and on that basis I wouldn't condemn Columbus. Neither would I condemn native Americans of the time for their behavior.

However, I think its pretty reasonable to choose who we celebrate now based on our own norms. While Columbus's actions were very significant, I'm not very interested in celebrating him specifically. I'd rather acknowledge his actions and their impact as a part of a broader "Americas day" or something like that.
 

DeletedUser8944

Well said Jaelis, Though he did not discover America first He did do something Great that changed the world and whether or not it should be celebrated does not mean FoE should not make an event centered around him. It was an event in the history of the world which is reason enough for me
 

Mustapha00

Well-Known Member
Actually, those peoples living in the Americas were pretty doggone adept at massacring and/or enslaving each other well before Columbus (Zing He, Erik The Red or whoever) 'discovered' America. If you're going to claim that Columbus was some sort of "terrorist", better make sure to describe the various chiefs of those tribes the same way.
 

DeletedUser

IGNORANT!!! Totally ignorant! Columbus has absolutely nothing to do with what happened after the settlers came here to the states. All Columbus did was discover this country for the western world. It has nothing at all to do with the slaughter of the Indian populous that existed here before. Forget about the savagery that they did to each other to establish their boundaries among themselves - BEFORE the Europeans came over including the French, Portuguese, and Spaniards before them!
 

DeletedUser13838

I think a lot of the hate against CC is ill founded but he was removed as viceroy of the indies (by the same people who gave us the spanish inquisition) for of tyranny so he wasn't exactly a super nice guy.
 

DeletedUser25149

Interesting arguments, but substantively not resolving the issue. The evils perpetrated by Cortez and Pizarro a half century after Columbus' discovery of the Carribbean are two entirely separate issues, though perhaps connected in some political and economic way. The mists of history and time perhaps confuse us to unduly demonize the curiosity of Columbus and his, for the era, notable accomplishment of exploration, a difficult concept to fathom in our present day global village.

If the issue at hand is the recognition of this man through a national holiday, his importance in the history of the USA is of questionable value, at best a small footnote. The reality of the situation is that he randomly landed somewhere near the North American continent a quarter of a millennium before the USA was ever dreamed of. How can we, with any historical credulity, credit him (or discredit him) with the villainy that future generations perpetrated against those whose continent this was at the time?

I agree with the notion that recognition with a national holiday is entirely incorrect, but not for the reason that he was responsible for any great evil, but rather that he was irrelevant to the history of the nation.

I entirely support the notion of a National Aboriginal Day, which would be a far more relevant historical and sociological marker to hold dear.
 

DeletedUser

US history was fictionalized for years to show only the positive impacts of exploration and cultural encounters, when the reality was that most indigenous people encountered early on were massacred and enslaved by many explorers who viewed them as another resource to be exploited in the regions they were exploring. But especially in Columbus's case; when he couldn't get them to provide the big gold deposits he was convinced they had access to, he started shipping them off to sell as slaves in Spain where many perished en-route and then the remaining died while in captivity. He tried to recoup his losses by capturing the rest of them from the Bahamas and ended up destroying over 250,000 people, completely ending the race of Arawaks.

Here is the whole entry made by Columbus, which FOE is also showing under the Columbus event but only partially:
"They ... brought us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which theyexchanged for the glass beads and hawks' bells. They willingly traded everything they owned... .They were well-built, with good bodies and handsome features.... They do not bear arms, and donot know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge and cut themselves out ofignorance. They have no iron. Their spears are made of cane... . They would make fine servants....With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want."

If anyone else wants to read more factual history, this is a good resource:
http://disciplinas.stoa.usp.br/pluginfile.php/159605/mod_resource/content/1/Zinn_Peoples_History.pdf

Here in the US, there is a big push to stop celebrating Columbus with a holiday and four states have in fact changed that day to "Indigenous People Day" with good success.

Even though I have enjoyed FOE for years, it makes me ill to participate in the event that glorifies one of the biggest terrorists in history. Please get rid of the Columbus event and change it to Indigenous People event, at least here in the US. Thank you.


Columbus did not discover America!
That was Amerigo Vespucci, hence the name America.
However Americans now prefer to refer to their homeland as US.
Us actually means broken or redundant (from the initials useless sh**e)
 

Mustapha00

Well-Known Member
Whatever European who 'discovered' North America and therefore paved the way for colonization would have received recognition in the form of a national holiday.
 

DeletedUser25952

Many years ago, the white man came to this land. He looked around and saw the indigenous people; he saw the women working the fields, tending to the children, cooking, cleaning and being good wives. He saw the men go out in the forest on hunting trips, bringing back their kills to have the women clean it and cook it for them. There was no taxes, no far-away government controlling their lives, and the white man looked at all of this and said, "I can make it better".
 

DeletedUser25952

Or if you want to hear me talk serious, consider how great a nation we live in.Let us not look at the big picture, as it is too big to cover in this forum. Let us instead consider that our country gave birth to great thinkers (and doers) such as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Dr George Washington Carver, Dr Martin Luther King, and (hold on there) Newt Gingrich! Flawed men all, but men who believed in something better and worked to make it so. The United States was fertile ground for them to grow and flourish. This nation began with slavery and (while not bloodless), grew to throw off this shameful institution. This nation began with a monarch, and grew to grant rights to the common man not seen before! This nation, while not perfect by any means, has grown to be a blessing to the world. This nation has stood to defy National Socialism, Fascism & Communism, holding forth a beaconing light of freedom for the world to see.

Have we been perfect? no. Will we ever be? Not in this life. But Newt Gingrich has seen through the flaws and has seen the heart of man that yearns to be free and to build something better for his children. It was through his eyes that I first saw the United States of America that I love today.

I am no more perfect than this great nation, but flawed as I am, I can choose to be a blessing each day to someone I meet. I can choose to vote my conscience in hopes that the men and women I send to represent me will also reflect a God that loves and desires the best for His children.
 

DeletedUser25952

Gosh Newt, I didn't know you played!

have you read my... er... his book, Contract With America? I was a card carrying Socialist when I read this book. It made me weep. Lest you think I have completely lost my soul, I also loved Walden Pond and I have a slight man crush on Eugene Victor Debs. I admire great men of all stripes. the greatest book, however, that I have ever read was Contract With America. It changed my life.

And now I even enjoy Rush (the band as well as the radio man).
 

DeletedUser8420

So lets show BOTH sides of the coins shall we. As one sided it was now it is done in reverse.

The indigenous people the same ones that practiced HUMAN sacrifice? YEP...It was the Europeans that demanded that human sacrificing be stopped but...before that how many did these indigenous people kill ripping out hearts, using human heads for games, drinking blood in rituals, skinning people alive...thousands upon thousands... just look at the history of the Aztecs...and the Mayans had human sacrificing also....

American Indians have slaves before any Euros arrived? YEP they sure did...Plains Indians was famous for raiding neighboring villages and taking women and children as slaves...There is even evidence that a group of "American" Indians located in the Mississippi Valley area in what we now call Illinois even practiced human sacrifices LONG before Columbus was even born. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/march/12/cahokia.htm

So we need to stop looking at things from our time period and understand things were MUCH different then.
 
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DeletedUser13452

Anyway, it was Columbus' discovery that led to further exploration and eventual colonization of this continent. That, in turn, led to revolutionary terrorism that founded a new country called the United States. That is why we celebrate his discovery. As for his regard for the native populations he encountered, he simply behaved as any European of that period would. It was the cultural norm. It may not be pretty, just the norm.
I might argue that many others discovered this continent long before Columbus, and therefore, we should stop crediting him with this discovery. But, nobody else would have ever treated native cultures any better.
 
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