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

(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.

"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.

I don't know how many Indians the Aztecs killed a year but they were killing a lot. The Spaniards wrote how the pyramids of Tenochtitlan were bright red with blood flowing down them ---- there's a box of children's skulls next to the pyramid in Cholula.

The Spaniards were greeted and welcomed by the non-Aztec tribes who saw Spanish as capable of whipping the Aztecs who they dreaded. The Spaniards got plenty of help from the Indians ---- and many of the Indians converted to the Christian God who they liked better than the blood-thirsty god the Aztecs were worshipping. The Aztecs resisted conversion --- but many others didn't.

What the hell were they the suppliers for Muslim heaven... I knew they were in cahoots

It does seem like the Aztecs might have been worshipping allah ---- there sure is a lot in common.

This nation began in 1776, true, but the Revolution began before that...you have to include Lexington and Concord in the American Revolution, and probably the Boston Tea Party...and why not the resistance to the Stamp Act in 1765? John Adams said of James Otis' speech against the use of writs of assistance that then and there the child independence was born.

Maybe 1607 (first permanent English settlement) or 1619 (first representative body created) would be a good starting point. The story of establishing the English colonies that later became the 13 original states is part of the American epic. The reason the Founding Fathers were able to create a free federal republic that worked was because they were heirs to generations of self-government and had practical experience. Contrast that with Latin America where they had no experience in self-government before independence.

The two hemispheres were going to meet at some point --- someone was going to start crossing the Atlantic Ocean --- if the Indians had been united, they probably could have defeated the Europeans but they didn't know to defend their borders, they didn't even have borders so they let in a bunch of people who would over-power them at some point.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.