Horowitz: (Columbus Day)"Protesters...only point fingers at white people"

CNSNews.com ^ | Oct 13,2003 | Marc Morano

[yankeedame]

Columbus' Critics Blamed for Pointing Fingers at Whites

Marc Morano
Senior Staff Writer

(CNSNews.com) - - On the day set aside to honor the famed explorer of the West Indies, Christopher Columbus is also the subject of protests across the country. But cultural critic David Horowitz has rallied to Columbus' defense.

Protesters who "only point fingers at white people" and allege that Columbus sparked the genocide of millions of Indians, ignore the fact that native populations visited by Columbus conducted their own forms of genocide.

Anti-Columbus demonstrations involve "the same people that celebrate Fidel Castro, Ho Chi Min, Chairman Mao and so forth," Horowitz told CNSNews.com . "And [they] are defending Saddam Hussein. This is ridiculous."

Horowitz is a former 1960s radical-turned-conservative and co-founder of the Los Angeles-based Center for the Study of the Popular Culture.

"It's easy to go throughout history and point fingers at people, but of course they only point fingers at white people," Horowitz said, referring to the anti-Columbus crowd.

Columbus' detractors have a selective view of history, according to Horowitz.

"These Indians were genocidal murderers. When do they protest the Aztec murders of virgins? They used to kill 80,000 virgins a year," Horowitz said.

Anti-Columbus protests were held recently on the campus of New York's Cornell University with students accusing the 15th century explorer of being responsible for the murder of more than 12 million Indians and participating in the Caribbean slave trade.

"Without taking a look at our human history, genocide could happen again," said Jason Corwin, media assistant for Cornell's film program, according to the student newspaper The Cornell Daily Sun .

Lloyd Elm, an American Indian studies professor at Cornell University, reportedly told the anti-Columbus rally that "traditional American schools sanitize information" and many students are led to believe that "the history of this great, great, country began in 1492."

The city of Denver, Colo., reportedly spent more than $100,000 on barricades and police overtime pay to prepare for any problems related to activities surrounding Columbus Day.

Horowitz conceded that European explorers of Columbus' time "were probably not too nice of people," but urged would-be protesters of Columbus Day to consider the historical context.

"White men gave to the Indians smallpox, the Indians gave us syphilis," Horowitz said, referring to an issue, the origin of syphilis, that many people still consider a historical dispute. You want to blame the Indians for all the deaths from syphilis in Europe for hundreds of years? I don't think so. You shouldn't blame these colonizers either," Horowitz said.

"It's racism and on the part of the whites, it's self-hatred taken to absurd heights," he added.

David Yeagley, an adjunct professor at Oklahoma University and a Comanche Indian, runs a website that bills itself as "the only voice of conservative American Indian thought." He called the anti-Columbus demonstrators "naive."

"If [the protestors] are trying to be historically accurate they would have to have a completely different message and that includes the history of Indians themselves -- the way we fought against each other with territorial disputes," Yeagley told CNSNews.com.

"I don't have a peacenik image of the American Indian. That is not my people and that is not the true history of Indian people in this country," Yeagley explained.

Yeagley's biggest concern, however, is the psychological impact that Christopher Columbus' critics are having on American Indians.

"It inhibits any Indian person, particularly any American Indian person, from starting out in life with a positive attitude. It puts you on the negative; it is the 'I have been wronged approach to life' even as you are born," Yeagley said.

American Indian youth may be the most vulnerable demographic in terms of accepting the idea that they are victims, according to Yeagley.

"I think that is just crippling to any kind of natural aspirations to young people. This is the most damaging thing that Indians can do to ourselves," he said.

[Verginius Rufus]

There is plenty of evidence of cannibalism in various parts of the Americas...of course the politically-correct types try to explain it all away as European lies. Cannibalism has been scientifically proven at one site in the American Southwest (human protein found in fossilized human feces).

There's an excellent movie on the theme of cannibalism in 16th-century Brazil, How Tasty Was My Little Frenchman.

[Moleman]

They used to kill 80,000 virgins per year
This one should be pretty safe

[cyborg]

Christopher Columbus discovered my mother's country... Trinidad. Meaning Holy Trinity for the three mountains he saw as his ship came into port, that city is called Port-of-Spain. I have Spanish explorer blood in me, and my father is Italian as well. I'm not ashamed of CC day at all. In fact, I'm at work honoring that work ethic that brought people so far to unknown places. The Arawaks I don't believe were as into the violence of the some of the more Central and Western South American tribes.

I wrote an essay about moving towards forgiveness and getting on life with the 500th anniversary of CC, for my college paper. The Native American students club loved it, but I got drummed out of the paper because certain groups didn't appreciate what I had to say. I think people today have more to worry about than what someone did 500 years ago personally.

[wolficatZ]

 

Gotta have pics to go along with the story!

http://www.rose-hulman.edu/~delacova/aztecs6.htm

[skeeter]

NO, life among the american indians was NOT like a "green peace" seminar.. it was more like a democrat political convention..

Plains indians were forced to move from location to location not only in search of game, but also because of the threat of disease, etc. caused by mounting heaps of trash at each campsite.

Understandable but at odds with the popular conception of indians being in 'harmony with nature'.

[mikegi]

ACTUALLY it's a great line to bait the multi cultis with. Let them come up with the real numbers which are quite appalling in their own right. The Aztecs were the Hitler/3rd Reich of that era.

Exactly. These are all bogus statistics anyway. Who knows what the real total was. Anyway, Horowitz makes this claim, the Lefties come back with 10,000, then Horowitz can cut them off at the knees by saying, "So you think that only killing 10,000 is ok?".

[yankeedame]

Women were not as valuable as horses.. the peaceful tribes were isolated and rare...

Have you got that right! I remember reading that when the conquestidors came across remote C. American tribes, said tribes assumed the pack-horses were the wives of the white men. I mean, after all, that's how they were accustomed to using their women.

[weegee]

Even if they survived into the modern era, what make them think that they'd be permitted to vote for the guy who rules over them? Without "the American way" many nations would likely still have monarchies and dictatorships.

[mikegi]

Well, I have tons of hostility from what was done to my ancient ancestors. In the 1700-1800s, Indians killed and stole from my ancestors as they travelled peacefully to Texas and California. Who can I sue?

Then there are the ultimate bad guys, the Romans. They conquered and abused my relatives in ancient England and Germany two thousand years ago. Who can I sue? I have yet to hear an apology.

Of course, who can forget the atrocities committed by the Neanderthals against my Cro-Magnon ancestors. WE owned that cave and it was stolen by the Neanderthals. The present value of that cave plus interest and penalty has to be in the billions. Where can I pick up my check? Where is the outrage?

Finally, I don't want to "species-ist" either. My family tree goes all the way back to the small mammals who were terrorized by the dinosaurs. I think I deserve a cut of the Jurassic Park royalties, don't you agree?

[Helms]

*" White guilt is what causes minority and Third World "inferiority" to stand as a negative moral judgment on the Western way of life. It presumes that Western success is the result not of three millennia of cultural evolution (much of it enhanced by contributions from what today we call the Third World) but of the ill-gotten gains of slavery and colonialism. Western success is presumed to have come at the price of Third World inferiority."(S.Steele)

[Roscoe Karns]

First meeting between noble,undefiled natives and homophobes.

[Porterville]

Source: Every book written about the Aztecs since 1901

[Porterville]

Source: Every book written about the Aztecs since 1901

[10mm]

What Chavez and all the other Columbus-haters fail to realize is that THEY WOULD NOT EVEN EXIST TODAY if it weren't for Columbus' brave voyage.

If they really want to protest the spread of European genes to the Americas, they need to commit suicide. Otherwise, it's just lip-service.

[LaraCroft]

Wow... I didn't know Yankedame was actually Horowitz! We have a famous person posting here!

[pawdoggie]

It is the height of revisionist historical absurdity to try to pick "hero" and "villain" in a clash of competing cultures that occurred 100 to 500 years ago. Imagine trying to pick the "hero" in the struggle between the ancient Egyptians and the Hittites, or the Assyrians and the Babylonians? Neither the white Europeans nor the American Indians had a monopoly on either kindness or cruelty. Some European nations (e.g. the French) were more favorably disposed to the native population of North America than others (e.g. the Spanish). Some Indian tribes were more accomodating and peaceful than others. In all cases, cultures behaved in accordance with their true (as opposed to their idealized) values, the worst of which have (thankfully) been abandoned over the years.

[yankeedame]

Wow... I didn't know Yankedame was actually Horowitz! We have a famous person posting here!

LOL! I only wish! I could use the money.